“And she was wonderful. She did all of those things, but she wasn’t you or Mom.” Abby shook her head, resigned to the fact that he would never understand. “What’s the point of fighting about this now? It’s all water under the bridge. We survived. Not every kid has an idyllic family, and our lives were certainly better than most.”
“I did the best I could,” Mick protested.
She gave him a pitying look. “Perhaps you did, but you know what? Maybe it’s because I’m the oldest, but I remember a time when you were better than that.”
She stood up then, rinsed out her own cup and put it in the dishwasher. “Good night, Dad. The girls are going to be thrilled to see you in the morning.”
She wished she could say the same. Though she knew with everything in her that he’d come home to try in some way to help with Jess’s predicament, she had this awful feeling that his presence was only going to make things worse.
Sunday morning Trace was sitting on the family’s dock, his feet dangling in the water, when Laila appeared. In her short shorts, halter top and with her long blond hair caught up in a careless ponytail, she looked about sixteen, not twenty-nine.
She handed him an icy can of soda. “How’s the prodigal son?” she inquired, kicking off her flip-flops and dropping down beside him on the smooth wood that had been warmed by the sun. Overhead, an eagle swooped through the air, then settled high in an old oak tree to watch over the scene from his lofty perch.
“Chomping at the bit to get back to New York,” he responded. “Which I could do if you weren’t so obstinate.”
She nudged him with her elbow. “Come on, admit it. You like being here.”
“For a visit,” he insisted. “I’ve never wanted any part of the bank. That was your dream, not mine.”
“Unfortunately, Daddy doesn’t see it that way. In his male-dominated world, the family estate must go to the eldest son. Daughters get whatever’s left over.”
He frowned at her. “Not the way I heard it. Dad said he offered you a position at the bank.”
“Did he happen to mention what that position was?”
“The same one I’m in, I assume.”
“Well, you assume wrong. He expected me to work as Raymond’s assistant, which, in case you haven’t figured out the pecking order there yet, amounts to a clerical job that any high school kid could do.”
Trace winced. “That was not the impression he gave me.”
“Ask him, if you don’t believe me.”
Unfortunately, Trace believed her. It would be just like his father to dangle a job in front of Laila, knowing that it was beneath her and that she’d turn it down. Then he could claim—as he had to Trace—that he’d given her a chance.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
She shrugged, pretending it didn’t matter, but Trace knew better.
“Don’t be sorry,” she claimed anyway. “It was just Dad being his usual sexist self. I’m used to it by now.”
“I don’t know if it helps, but I’ve told him you’re the one he should be grooming to take over.”
“Oddly enough, it does help.”
They sat in silence for a few minutes, before she glanced his way. “Abby’s in town. Did you know that?”
“I’d heard she might be coming for a visit,” he replied neutrally.
“Have you seen her?”
He shook his head. “But I imagine we’ll cross paths before she leaves.”
“How do you feel about that?”
“We’re adults,” he said with a touch of impatience. “It’s been a long time. I’m sure we’ll manage to be civil, Laila.”
“I didn’t ask how you expected to behave. I asked how you feel about seeing her again. We both know she was the love of your life and you’ve never gotten over her.”
He regarded her wryly. “Oh, we both know that, do we?”
“Well, I know it,” she said, giving him a crooked smile. “You, however, may be too stupid and stubborn to admit it. You are a guy, after all.”
“I’m not discussing Abby with you.”
Laila wasn’t easy to deter once she’d gotten her teeth into a subject. “Come on, Trace. Admit it. It just about killed you when she left town. I was here. I saw what it did to you.”
“Then why would you want to remind me of all that now?”
“Because this could be your chance to find out what happened.”
“I know what happened. Abby made a decision to cut me out of her life. End of story.”
“That’s not the end of the story,” his sister contradicted. “It’s only the part of the story you know. Find out the rest. Maybe it will put an end to that whole episode once and for all, so you can move on.”
“I moved on years ago,” he claimed.
“Baloney!”
He stared at her, his lips twitching. “What are we, five?”
“I’m not, but that seems to be your maturity level when it comes to this one thing. Adults face each other and deal with their issues.”
“I’m not the one who left. Have you had this conversation with Abby?”
“I did ten years ago,” Laila admitted.
Trace flinched. “Really? And what did Abby reveal to you that she didn’t bother telling me?”
“She told me to butt out, as a matter of fact.”
He laughed, but there was little humor in the sound. “Seems like good advice to me.”
He was struck by the same nagging thought that had come to him at the bank on his first day there. “You haven’t shared any of this with Dad, have you?”
“About you and Abby? No, why?”
He studied her face, trying to decide if he could trust what she was saying. “It just seems awfully convenient that Dad decides to push this whole idea of getting me to work at the bank right when there’s going to be a battle with the O’Briens that was bound to bring Abby back to town.”
“You mean that possible foreclosure at the inn?” she asked innocently. “Do you think that’s why Abby’s here?”
“Don’t you?”
“I suppose that makes sense,” she conceded. “Abby’s always been smart about business, and she’s always been the first one Jess turns to.”
“And none of that crossed your mind when you heard about the bank foreclosing on Jess’s property? Or when you heard that Dad was dragging me back here?”
“Believe it or not, I don’t spend a lot of my spare time coming up with conspiracies with Dad. And if it had been up to me, you’d still be in New York, and I’d be in that big corner office at the bank dealing with Jess.”
“Okay, then,” Trace said, deciding he might as well take her at her word. He was probably imagining a conspiracy where none existed. After all, Abby was here and he was just about one hundred percent certain to see her. How that inevitable confrontation had been set into motion hardly mattered. He just had to brace himself for it, so he didn’t make a complete fool of himself when they crossed paths. Throwing her across his desk and kissing her was probably a bad idea. And actually he hoped he wouldn’t want to.
Gram fixed a Sunday dinner that could have fed an army and insisted that all of them sit down at the table together, including Caitlyn and Carrie, whose table manners left a lot to be desired. Still, Abby thought they provided an excellent buffer between her sister and her father. Jess was shoo
ting distrustful glances at Mick, to which he seemed to be oblivious. He kept asking questions about the inn that were supposedly innocent. Under the circumstances, though, they were as highly charged as an entire crate of explosives.
“No business at the table,” Gram finally said when Jess looked as if she was about to throw down her napkin and bolt. “I’m sure we can think of other things to talk about. After all, when was the last time we had a chance to be together under this roof? Let’s make this meal as special as the occasion calls for.”
“How are Uncle Jeff and Uncle Tom?” Abby asked, seizing on the first thing that came to mind.
“How would I know?” Mick responded bitterly. The implication in his tone was that he didn’t much care, either. Obviously neither time nor Gram had mellowed his mood when it came to his brothers.
The breakup of the business partnership had taken a personal toll. It had exposed all of the philosophical and environmental differences of the brothers. Since like all O’Briens, none of them were willing to back down from a stance, working together had been a really bad idea from the beginning. That they’d actually completed Chesapeake Shores at all had been a miracle.
Gram scowled at Mick, then turned to Abby. “They’re fine. Tom’s working on legislation to protect the bay and trying to get funding to clean up the waters of both the bay and its tributaries. Jeff’s running the management company that handles the leases on the shops downtown. His daughter, Susie, is working for him.”
“Gosh, I haven’t seen Susie in ages,” Abby said. “She was still a kid when I left for New York.”
“She graduated from college last year,” Jess said. “Magna cum laude, right, Gram?”
Gram ignored the hint of sarcasm in Jess’s voice and said evenly, “I believe that’s right. Jeff was real proud of her.”
“How’s your mother, Abby?” Mick suddenly blurted. “You see her, don’t you?”
Abby saw the deep hurt in his eyes and felt the same pity she always did when her mother plied her with questions about the rest of the family. “We get together for lunch every couple of weeks and she spends time with the girls on Saturdays when she can. She’s doing well. She loves living in the city.”
“I’m sure she does,” Mick said with undisguised bitterness, clamping his mouth shut when Abby pointedly nodded toward the girls to remind him that they didn’t need to hear so much as a whisper spoken against their grandmother.
“Grandma Megan’s beautiful,” Caitlyn said, then looked at Mick with confusion. “Do you know her?”
Abby realized that since her kids had never seen Mick and Megan together, they couldn’t possibly understand the complexities of the relationship.
The shadows in Mick’s eyes deepened as he responded to his granddaughter. “I used to,” he said softly.
“Grandma Megan used to be married to Grandpa Mick,” Abby explained.
That stirred a spark of interest in Carrie’s eyes. “Did you get a ’vorce like Mommy and Daddy?”
Mick nodded. “We did.”
“Did you still love your kids?” Caitlyn asked worriedly. “Mommy and Daddy say they’ll love us forever and ever, even if they don’t love each other anymore.”
“Moms and dads never stop loving their children,” Mick assured her. His solemn gaze flicked to Jess when he said it, as if trying to communicate that message to her. She resolutely turned away, focusing her attention on cutting the meat on her plate into tiny pieces which she then shoved aside and left uneaten.
Sensing that this topic was no safer than business, Abby stood up. “Girls, why don’t I get you some ice cream and we can eat it outside? You’ll excuse us, won’t you?” She was already rising when she asked and didn’t wait for a reply.
Carrie and Caitlyn scrambled down from their chairs with a shout and raced for the kitchen, Abby on their heels. It wasn’t until she was safely away from the tension in the dining room that she sighed with relief. Okay, she’d just thrown Jess to the wolves in there, but right this second it felt like every woman needed to fend for herself.
“What kind of ice cream can we have, Mommy?” Carrie asked, tugging on her slacks.
“Let’s see what Gram has in the freezer,” she said, though she knew the answer. There had never been a time when the freezer wasn’t stocked with strawberry, Gram’s favorite, and with chocolate, which had always been Mick’s, hers and her brothers’ first choice. Jess’s had always been vanilla fudge ripple, so that was bound to be there, too.
She gave the girls their choices—they agreed on strawberry, for once—then dished up a scoop for each one. “Outside,” she said as she handed them the plastic bowls and spoons. “I’ll be right behind you.”
She gave herself a double scoop of chocolate, then covered it with hot fudge sauce for good measure. The way this day was going she was going to need every bit of chocolate decadence she could find to get through it.
4
A bby was glad she’d flown home still dressed in the black power suit she’d worn to work on Friday morning. She pressed it before putting it on Monday morning, then drove over to pick up Jess. When Abby arrived, Jess was still wearing paint-splattered shorts and a faded T-shirt. Abby barely held in a sigh. It looked as if Jess had gotten distracted by one of her decorating projects.
“Sorry,” Jess said, her expression flustered. “I lost track of the time. I couldn’t sleep, so I started painting at the crack of dawn, then someone called in a reservation—”
Abby cut her off. “Jess, we don’t have time for this. You can’t go to the bank like that,” she said, trying not to lose patience. Jess was obviously tense enough without Abby yelling at her. “You know how important this meeting is. It’s critical that we handle it as professionally as possible. Change, and do it fast, please.”
“Five minutes, I promise. You go on ahead. I’ll meet you there.”
Abby nodded and drove off, relieved in some ways that she was going in alone. She could say things then that she wouldn’t want to say in front of her sister, admit to Jess’s failings but stress that her sister had backup now and that things would be on track from here on out.
When they opened the door at Chesapeake Shores Community Bank, she walked in as if she owned the place and headed straight for Lawrence Riley’s office. She beamed at Mariah Walsh, who’d been working there as far back as she could recall.
“Abby, what on earth are you doing back in town?” Mariah asked.
“Visiting family,” she said. “How’ve you been?”
“Same as always. Just a few more years on me.”
Abby nodded toward Mr. Riley’s office. “Is he in?” she asked. “I need to speak to him.”
“What’s it about?” Mariah asked, already picking up the phone.
“Jess’s loans on the inn.”
Mariah frowned and hung up. “Then you’ll need to speak to Trace.”
Abby felt her heart lurch at the mention of Trace Riley. It had been years since they’d seen each other, and it was ridiculous that hearing his name was enough to make her falter. But in that instant, she realized exactly what Jess had been keeping from her. Jess had known that Trace was involved in this situation and that Abby would have to deal with him and not his father.
Trying to recover her equilibrium before Mariah could see how thrown she’d been, she said, “Trace is working here? I’m surprised.” He’d always sworn that hell would freeze over before he’d work in a bank, much less for his
father.
Mariah grinned. “Hell’s sure enough frozen over, huh? He just started last week and he says it’s just temporary. His father’s hoping that’ll change. In the meantime, though, he’s in charge of the loan department.”
Damn, Abby thought. Maybe that could work in her favor, but she doubted it. The last time they’d seen each other, she’d slept with him, told him she was in love with him and then she’d taken off for New York without another word.
Over the months and years that followed, she’d convinced herself that she’d had no choice, that Trace was a distraction she couldn’t afford. In fact, she’d had a whole litany of reasons that had made perfect sense to her at the time. She’d even told herself she was cutting things off for him as much as for herself.
Of course, she should have had the guts to tell him that in person, though. Instead, she’d taken the coward’s way out, because he tempted her in ways she’d found all but impossible to resist. Had she seen him one more time there was no telling what might have happened to her resolve to go to New York and start a career on Wall Street. She might even have been persuaded to stay with him right here. He’d obviously caved in to parental pressure, just as she’d always feared he might. That fear had made it impossible to trust all the pretty words he’d said, all the promises he’d made about their future.
Mariah gave her a knowing look. “His office is down the hall on the left. Want me to call and tell him you’re on your way in?”
“I think I’d better surprise him,” Abby replied, then stiffened her spine and headed for his office. She’d had enough uncomfortable meetings to steel her resolve for this one. She tapped on the door, then walked in without waiting for a reply.
Trace was on the phone, his gaze directed out the window. Distractedly, he waved her toward a seat without even turning around. She breathed a sigh of relief at the reprieve. It gave her time to study him.
The Inn at Eagle Point Page 6
