Dagnab it, he’d promised his papa to find the man who’d delivered him, a man named Elias Chandler. Find him and pay back the money Papa owed him. Trouble was, he’d been having so much fun begetting and piling up worldly riches on top of what his papa had piled up before him that he’d put it off too long.
Of his five young’uns, only two had survived childhood. Whooping cough had taken the twins. Little Emaline had drowned in the creek. That had left Lance and poor Coley.
Lance couldn’t do it. Coley, he couldn’t do it, either. Nice enough fellow—smart for a politician, but sickly. It was up to these two, Lance’s son Carson and Coley’s son, Lancelot.
Good-looking boys, if he did say so. Both of ’em. Took after him in that respect. Likely had to beat the women off with a stick.
The years fell away, and Eli was once more a young man. Those were the days, oh my, yes. Smiling inwardly, although it never showed on his face, the old man closed his eyes.
“Should I call the nurse?” Carson whispered.
“He’s sleeping. Mom says he sleeps most of the time. No pain involved—at least we can be thankful for that. Ever stop to think there could be a downside to the family longevity gene?”
“Tell you one thing—in case I live that long, I’m going to start practicing how to use my eyes the way PawPaw does. You ever get the feeling he’s telling us to quit hanging around here and get on with paying off his debt?”
“It was actually his father’s debt, the way I heard it.”
“Yeah…I guess.”
“Any luck yet? If you can get your woman to spread the wealth to the rest of her kinfolks, I’ll ante up my share and we can wind this thing up PDQ.” The men had agreed to put in ten thousand each of their own, without telling their grandfather. It wouldn’t do PawPaw any good now to know that the stock he’d been supposed to deliver more than half a century ago was worthless—that while they’d all been fiddling away their time, Rome had burned.
The two men stepped outside in the hall, where they could speak above a whisper. Carson was hobbling around on crutches now. One of his arms was still in a sling, which made maneuvering tricky, but he got around pretty well for a guy who’d been targeted by a drug dealer armed with a two-ton truck. Beckett told himself it was a good thing his cousin was a fast healer, else he’d be ripe for a psychiatric ward by the time he finally shed the last of his fiberglass shell. Patience wasn’t one of Car’s virtues.
Nor his own, Beckett acknowledged.
“Mom’s coming over this afternoon,” he said. “Miss Dora will spell her for a couple of hours later on.” He held the elevator door open, then waited until they were outside the hospital before bringing his cousin up-to-date. Standing in the shade of a big magnolia tree, he said, “You were asking if I’d located the Edwards woman? No trouble, I told you that on the phone. You want to know if I handed over the money? Yeah, I did that, too. Trouble is, she handed it right back.”
“What do you mean, she handed it back? She crazy, or what?”
“Spooked, I guess. You read her record, at least what there was of it.”
“Which wasn’t all that much,” Carson said thoughtfully. “Mostly, it covered the husband. If I remember correctly, no charges were ever brought against her.”
“Yeah, well whatever happened, she’s still gun-shy. I don’t know—could be a guilty conscience for living high at the expense of all those poor suckers her husband conned. Maybe she’s doing penance, living in a rundown house out in the middle of corn country, selling stuff in a roadside stand.”
“Hey—whatever works. But she can use the money, right?”
“Oh, she could use the money, all right. The problem is getting her to accept it. I don’t know if it’s pride or what. I played it safe and gave her the papers to read first, figuring once she understood, we could wind things up. But, hell, you know the condition they were in, and when I tried to explain….”
Beckett shoved his sunglasses up on top of his head, sighed and mentally retraced his steps. “At least, I think I did. The old guy—the one she’s living with? Baseball nut. There was a game going on with the volume turned up full blast, and to tell the truth, I’m not sure who said what, now that I think back. Once we got to my motel—”
“She went with you to your motel? Oh, brother.”
“Hold on, it wasn’t like that. I left the money with her uncle. Once she discovered it, she came after me, loaded for bear. Matter of fact, she was there in the room when you called last night.”
“Okay, so you handed over the money. Then what? She gave it back? So where does that leave us?”
Beckett flexed his shoulders, trying to ease the stiffness in his back. Seemed as if he’d been sleeping in a different bed every night for the past year. Some nights he never even made it to bed. “Bottom line, I’ll have to go back and hog-tie the lady long enough to make her listen, then stuff the money in her apron pocket and get out of Dodge—or whatever the name of the place is—before she can throw it back at me.”
“Apron pocket? You trying to tell me the woman I saw on CNN wearing a hot-looking designer gown—the woman who owned a fancy house in Dallas and a condo in Vegas—she’s wearing an apron these days? Man, that’s taking penance pretty damned far.”
Beckett nodded. He was dog tired from too many sleepless nights.
“Yeah, she wears an apron. But if you’re thinking hausfrau, think again. Think like, diamond tiara wrapped up in brown paper sack. Any way you wrap it, it’s still a diamond tiara.”
“Classy, huh?”
“And then some.” That was one way to describe her. Skinny women had never been a real big turn-on for him, but then, he’d never before met a woman like Eliza Chandler. “Funny thing, though—maybe I’m overcaffeinated, but I get this feeling there’s something going on in her life that’s got her spooked.”
“So maybe she wasn’t as clean as she was made out to be.” Carson readjusted his crutch to a more comfortable position. “Maybe she copped a plea when her husband went down. According to my sources in Dallas, they didn’t spend too much time together the last few years. He traveled a lot, usually with a female companion, but they put in joint appearances at a few fancy social functions. Art openings, charity bashes—things like that. Enough to get their names and faces in the social columns. According to one of the reports I read, she’s not even on the books as a witness in New York, where a lot of this stuff went down.”
“Yeah, well…that’s their take. Big-city cops probably figured you bubbas down here wouldn’t know what to do with the information if they handed it over, so why bother.”
“Could be, Bucket…could be. Anyhow, this bubba still has some work to do. I’ve got this physical therapist jerking me around three days a week. She looks like one of Charlie’s Angels, but I’m pretty sure she was a drill sergeant in a former life.”
Beckett chuckled. “You’re the only guy I ever knew who flunked phys ed in high school.”
“Hey, it was boring, what can I say? I’m more the cerebral type. Look, how about asking your lady if she’ll contact her cousin so I won’t have to go through what you’ve been going through. This old body can’t take too much more punishment.”
His lady. A vision of Eliza Chandler formed in Beckett’s mind, complete with long, lean, calico-clad body, snapping light brown eyes and masses of auburn hair that refused to be confined. For a mouth that was clearly made for passion, hers could clamp shut quicker than any snapping turtle he’d ever taunted with a broom handle as a kid. “You got it, but look—don’t count on too much. First I’ve got to get her to sit still long enough to hear what it’s all about. Evidently she’s got her mind all made up that I’m some kind of creep trying to con her into playing games.”
“Now, why would she think that?” Carson asked, all innocence.
“Dammit, not that kind of game!”
“Famous last words,” Carson said with a smirk.
Liza threw her book across the room an
d asked herself why she’d ever wasted her money buying it in the first place. She knew the answer, of course. Because there was a baseball game almost every night, which meant that she could either watch with her uncle or go to her room and read. And because she didn’t have a social life.
She’d declined several invitations—graciously, she hoped—from the women who supplied the stand, to join them at Wednesday night prayer meeting. By the end of the day, she was usually too tired to go out, anyway. Besides, she’d always been a reader. She had favorite authors she could rely on, knowing that no matter how frustrating her days were, she had a good, safe place to disappear for a few hours.
What she hadn’t counted on was having the aggravating image of a man who might or might not be a crook come between her and the printed page. “Well, shoot,” she muttered. Obviously, she’d been reading too many romances.
From the living room came the drone of the post-game analysis. Uncle Fred was snoring. She’d have to wake him up to go to bed, but that was all a part of the unspoken bargain they’d struck that day last spring when she’d shown up on his doorstep.
One of these days, she reminded herself, he wouldn’t be here. She would miss him more than she would have thought possible only a year ago. The house would have to be sold, rotted eaves, sagging floors and all, and she’d have to move on. Again. She didn’t want to think of it now, so, mostly, she didn’t.
He was family, after all. The only family she had left except for a cousin she hadn’t seen in years. And dammit, since she’d lost her address book, she didn’t even have Kit’s last address. She could write to the publisher, of course. Kit wrote children’s books. She’d called over a year ago to say that her latest creation, Claire the Loon, was being optioned by a TV producer. Liza had been out, and Kit had left a message, but no clue as to how to get in touch with her. At the time, Liza had been putting the Dallas house up for sale and liquidating every possible asset. Evidently, Kit hadn’t heard about the scandal. At least she hadn’t mentioned it.
Liza bent to retrieve the book she’d flung across the room in disgust, mostly at herself for not being able to concentrate. She reached behind the door for her nightgown just as the phone rang in the kitchen.
It was too early for her creepy caller. On the other hand, it was too late for any of her suppliers. Uncle Fred’s friends usually called during the day.
She reached for the phone on the fourth ring, then waited until the fifth to lift the receiver. “Hello?”
“Eliza?”
Air left her lungs in a whoosh. She felt behind her for a chair. “What do you want?”
“Would you please just set aside your suspicions and think about what I said? Ask your uncle if he knows anything about your family’s history.” Before she could respond, he said, “But I guess he’s the wrong side, isn’t he? He’s your mother’s brother, not your father’s.”
She hooked a chair with her foot and sat, willing her heart to slow down. “Actually, he’s my maternal grandfather’s brother, but that’s none of your business.” The silence lasted for three beats. Then, in a quieter tone, she said, “How about your grandfather, uh, PawPaw? Is he all right?”
“Thanks. Yeah, he’s still hanging in there. Waiting for you to come to your senses and let me square things so he can die in peace.”
She took instant offense, as if his grandfather’s health were somehow dependent on her. “You’re waiting for him to die? What kind of creep are you, anyway?”
Too tired to try to justify himself, Beckett cut her off. “Eliza, PawPaw’s over a hundred years old. We’re not quite sure how old he really is, but I don’t think he’ll be around too much longer. And, yeah, before you ask, I’m sorry. I’ll miss him—we all will. Now, how about it, can we talk again? This time will you just listen while I explain and then take the damned money?”
“I’ll think about it,” she said after a long pause. Great. She’d think about it. “Fine. You do that.”
Beckett decided to hold back on asking about her cousin Kathryn and any other cousins they hadn’t been able to confirm until he’d solidified his position. After that, with any luck, he would be able to concentrate on business long enough to meet with a couple of ship owners in Newport News, maybe another one in Morehead City, and get back to Charleston in time to help deal with whatever came next, be it a nursing home or a funeral home.
God, he was tired.
Had he or had he not told her to expect him to show up in the next day or so?
Dammit, PawPaw, hang in there. I’m not ready yet to let you go!
After hanging up the phone, he sat in the semi-darkness of the east room of the elegant old house where the distinguished old man had once read him stories about Blackbeard’s exploits off the Carolinas. Oddly enough, he could easily picture Eliza here in the same room, maybe arranging flowers or talking over the day’s events with his parents, his friends.
The room no longer smelled of cigar and pipe tobacco, but of leather, wood polish and the eucalyptus oil his mother used to refresh her bowls of potpourri. It was a familiar smell, one he hadn’t realized he’d missed until lately. Lavender in the linen closet, cedar in the coat closet, eucalyptus in the potpourri. Funny the way different scents could arouse different emotions, different memories. A whiff of cinnamon always made him homesick, no matter where he happened to be. His mother’s cinnamon-raisin bread, fresh from the oven…
Rebecca Jones Beckett was a terrific cook. She and Miss Dora, the housekeeper, fought for kitchen dominance. Miss Dora usually won because of his mother’s many social and charitable obligations.
Now she was spending most of her time at the hospital, taking benne seed wafers or whiskey cookies to the nurses, driving his father and his breathing apparatus back and forth and helping his uncle Lance interview companions for his aunt Kate, who was in the early stages of Alzheimer’s.
Close family ties, Beckett thought with a deepened sense of his own mortality, were both a blessing and a burden. He couldn’t imagine being without them. All the same, in these uncertain times he couldn’t imagine a man’s deliberately taking on the responsibility of a wife and kids. Not that there had ever been any guarantees.
Unlike premature graying, the commitment gene was one that had skipped his generation. Carson showed no more inclination to settle down than he did. Which probably meant the end of this particular branch of Becketts, he admitted with an unexpected shaft of regret. His mother would be disappointed. Already was, for that matter. She’d had her grandkids’ names picked out and waiting for years.
Idly he wondered if it was family feeling alone that had brought Eliza Chandler from the high-rent district of a big Western city to the boondocks of rural North Carolina. Could be she was trying to outdistance her past, if she’d been a part of her husband’s scams after all. Maybe she’d skated clear by using her looks and that touch-me-not attitude she projected so well. Wouldn’t be the first time something like that had happened. On the other hand, she might simply have come to the rescue of an elderly relative.
He yawned, stretched and thought about replacing the mattress in his old bedroom with a king-size model. But that would mean getting rid of the old mahogany sleigh bed, and his mother would be unhappy. He’d sleep on the carriage-house floor before he’d add to her woes.
Not that he’d spent all that much time here over the past few years, anyway. If he ever did decide to move his headquarters from Delaware to Charleston, he would definitely need to get a place of his own, else his mother would be running his business instead of just trying to run his life. For all he loved her more than anyone in the world, Becky Beckett was one managing woman. The proverbial steel magnolia.
Five
It was two days later when Beckett pulled into the Grants’ driveway. Queen Eliza’s modest chariot was parked close to the house. Beyond that, between the house and a half-grown holly tree, what appeared to be an old Packard was permanently enshrined on four cement blocks. The fact that he even
recognized the make made him feel older than his thirty-nine and a quarter years.
“Must be the life I lead,” he muttered as he skirted a ladder propped against the roof, dodged a pot of pink and purple flowers and knocked on the screen door.
Funny, he mused as he waited for her to answer the door, the way the dilapidated old house looked so familiar. He’d been here, what? Twice? Even that crazy old fruit-and-vegetable stand out front, with its homemade counters and bins and its rusted tin roof, looked welcoming. He couldn’t say much for her security system—a flimsy wraparound wall made of hinged lattice panels with a single padlock. But then, maybe fresh produce wasn’t that much of a draw to shoplifters.
Beckett heard her muttering from somewhere inside the house. He’d tried unsuccessfully to call from New Bern and again from Elizabeth City. She needed an answering machine, if her old rotary dial phone could be retrofitted to support such an accessory.
“Ready or not, here I come,” he muttered. He had a twinge in the small of his back from too many hours of driving and he was working on a pressure headache. Both complaints fell off the radar screen the minute he saw her.
What was it about this particular woman that riveted the attention of every male cell in his body? She was beautiful, sure, but he’d seen beautiful women before. Feature by feature, there was nothing particularly outstanding about her. Yet, even in the middle of a family crisis, he couldn’t seem to pry her from his mind.
Which was plain crazy. Because despite the hasty research into her background and a few nonproductive conversations, he scarcely knew the woman.
She greeted him with a dry “I might’ve known.” But then, he could hardly expect her to welcome him with open arms. He tried to picture her welcoming her late ex-spouse at the end of a workday. Hello, honey, how was your day? Rip off any more senior citizens?
Somehow, it didn’t ring true.
She’d screwed her hair into a shaggy knot and anchored it with that tortoiseshell gadget again. She was barefoot, wearing pants that were a few inches too short—or maybe they were meant to show off her world-class calves. No makeup. Wouldn’t want anyone to get the wrong idea, now would we? He wondered if she realized how sexy she looked with her naked mouth looking rebellious and just a little bit pouty.
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