“We’re making it work, I guess. You know, you do what you have to do,” she said, and then she had an idea. What if she just confessed? What if she just told him outright that she had had a dream that she had pushed Brooke, that Brooke fell and hit her head, then Layla woke up to find that Brooke had died from a serious head injury?
He’d never believe her, and what if that worked in her favor? Maybe they could laugh it off as a joke. Ha ha ha, how strange is that? Weird. Yeah. Weird.
She would say, Wow, I’ve felt really guilty about it for years.
And he would say, Well, you shouldn’t. I mean, it was a dream, after all.
And that would be the end of that.
Maybe. At least she would have finally gotten the truth off her chest.
She drew in a deep breath and decided to just keep the confession simple. “Mason, there’s something I need to tell you.”
“I know, and I’m sorry about this morning with Jordan. I told her she couldn’t come out here again. If I were you I’d be upset, too.”
She gestured for Mason to take a seat on the couch. “That wasn’t exactly what I was going to say. I need to tell you something. I probably should have mentioned this a long time ago, but I wasn’t sure how to do that. It’s an unusual problem. Complicated, really—”
He stared at the couch for a moment before he sat and then he said, “I’m sorry to interrupt. I just don’t want there to be any rude surprises or secrets between us. I think Jordan is about to put something into motion that affects us both.”
The seriousness of his tone and the mention of Jordan’s name made her stop. She waved for him to continue and expected him to say something about how Jordan still blamed her for Brooke’s death and her brain injury. And he did. But he also said she was jealous and was going to try to put a stop to Alcott Manor’s plans for tourism.
“What?”
“Maybe I shouldn’t have taken such a hard line with her. But she doesn’t always take no for an answer.” He shook his head in disgust. “Um, Jordan and I saw one another for a while. We were both living in New York at the time, and I think dating one another had more to do with some unresolved grief over Brooke’s death than anything else. It wasn’t serious, but the whole thing was probably just a textbook reaction.”
Layla felt something in her gut curdle at the thought of Mason and Jordan together, and she looked away.
“Anyway, I realized it before Jordan did. She wasn’t all too happy when I called it off. I think that’s the real reason why she’s set Alcott Manor as her target.”
“Can she seriously stop us from opening the house for tours? Or from finishing the restoration?”
“Her dad’s the mayor and he’s always been a little shady, I think. I wouldn’t be surprised if he tried to shut things down for us.”
“Us?”
He drew in a deep breath. “She said if I worked here or if you and I were together that she would make it difficult for me to get any more business done.”
The room spun around and around, as if she were heading down the drain.
The income gone.
Mason gone.
She put her head in her hands. She had to have the money she was due from the manor. She needed that income to pay off Asher’s debt and to take care of her daughters.
He placed his hand on her back and she felt a rush of comfort from him.
“What did you tell her?”
“I told her not to do that. That she was messing with people’s lives. Of course she thinks that this is—”
She felt a chill roll over her. “Payback.”
He nodded, his lips pulled tight in a grimace. “She’s never gotten over losing her sister or the fact that she has the brain injury. She still swears that you’re the one who did it. Over the years I kept her from acting on that. Now that I’m no longer in the picture, I think she’ll try whatever she can to get her revenge. I’ve put a call in to some of Tom’s contacts to see what we can do about this. And I’ll talk with her again.”
“I’m so sorry, Mason.”
He frowned slightly, as though he didn’t understand. “About what?”
“I—” She started to tell him that this was all her fault, then she realized with a jolt that she couldn’t. Someone had to resolve things with Jordan.
If Tom were still alive he would have stepped in and handled everything, as he always had. He would have brought Jordan to the manor for coffee, listened to her, reasoned with her. He would have charmed her right out of their way. Then he would have met with the mayor and found a way to get him to back down, too.
But Tom was gone now and Jordan would never listen to Layla. No matter how she tried to negotiate with her, Jordan wouldn’t stop her efforts to shut down the manor until she succeeded. Because she would always see Layla as the one who ruined her life, the one who was her sister’s killer.
Which she was.
Layla couldn’t tell Mason that she had killed Brooke. Not now. She needed him to resolve this with Jordan, and she needed for him to finish the restoration. If she told him the truth about what she had done, he would leave.
“Damn it!” She paced the floor and fought the urge to scream and pound her fists.
“I know.” He stood and watched her, his expression lined with all the anger she felt.
“She probably left the manor and went straight to her father’s office. God knows what they’ve already done. All he has to do is make a phone call and we have a boulder in our path,” she said.
“I’m not going to let her ruin this for you and your family. I’ll think of something to stop her.”
She would have to let him, too, because she didn’t have any other options. “If you spoke with her, she’d listen to you, wouldn’t she?”
His jaw muscles worked. “Probably. She’s pretty pissed at the idea that you and I might be seeing one another. But I’ll think of something.”
“You told her we were together?”
“She asked, and I told her who I was seeing was none of her business.”
Layla liked this side of Mason. The knight in shining armor who defended her honor and fought for what he wanted.
“I meant what I said last night. I would like to rekindle our friendship, I’d like to make things right, and I’d really like to take you out.”
The house wrapped its thick blanket of quiet around them, and it felt as though they were the only two people around for miles. She was torn between wanting the togetherness she had tasted the night before and backing away because of all the reasons why they wouldn’t work.
The closer he stepped toward her, the more she wanted him—for herself and to claim the future she believed they had lost so long ago.
“Is that what you would like, too?”
“Very much,” she answered honestly.
He flashed a smile that was fiercely confident, then he lowered his lips to hers in a kiss that was soft and tender, slow and promising.
The ring from Mason’s phone interrupted them. He answered and asked the caller to hold for a moment. “This is one of Tom’s friends in City Hall. Why don’t you pack a bag with swimsuits and sun lotion for you and the girls? I’ll pick y’all up in about an hour and we’ll get out of here for a while.”
She agreed. The secret she had carried for more than ten years felt heavier than ever before.
20
Mason’s red pickup truck managed to hit every pothole on the dirt road, bouncing the girls into wide-smiled giggles in the back seat. Winston seemed to have a smile on his face. With so much on her mind, Layla didn’t think a smile was possible for her, but her daughters’ laughter tipped the corners of her lips.
“What did Tom’s friend say?” she kept her voice low.
“He’s reaching out to all of his contacts, letting them know what’s coming, but that Mayor Williams has a lot of influence. More than we would like.” Mason shifted his glance between Layla and the road. She tried to ignore the frightened look that
widened his eyes and tightened his lips into a line.
“Which means what, exactly?”
“It means that if the mayor does what his darling daughter wants, that we could be in real trouble.”
A brick formed in Layla’s stomach around the two cupcakes she had wolfed after Mason left the manor. She stared out the window and tried not to think of the what-goes-around-comes-around nature of this fiasco.
“I’m going to talk to her,” he said and squeezed Layla’s hand. “I’ll get her to stop. I won’t let her get away with this. I won’t.” He squeezed her hand again.
Jordan had always been jealous of Brooke where Mason was concerned, and Layla suspected Jordan had wanted him for her own long before Brooke died.
“I’d like to say this isn’t your problem. But the truth is that I really appreciate your help.”
“I’ve already called her. Left her a message.”
She nodded, not at all knowing how he would get her to back off. His truck hummed beneath her with its hypnotic melody. She remembered his father driving the same truck, she and Mason side by side in the front seat, the three of them singing along to the old Hank Williams song “Jambalaya” that his dad played on cassette tape.
She glanced around the woodsy area that surrounded them. The ancient, craggy water oaks, the towering pines with the occasional eagle’s nest at the top, and the rays of the lowering sun bursting now and then through the thicket. When the truck hugged a familiar S-curve in the dirt road, she knew exactly where he was taking her.
“Are we going to old man Edmonton’s lake house?” she asked.
“No.”
She looked around the country road that was as familiar to her as the back of her hand. “We are. And we’re about to come up on some overgrown blueberry bushes. Right next to that slate rock boulder—see?”
“Oh, this is definitely the road you remember. The one where we—”
“Shhh—” She smacked his arm with the back of her hand and nodded to the girls. She did not want them hearing about what a wild child she had often been as a teenager. She didn’t need her credibility ruined with her children.
He leaned closer to her. “Where we skipped school so we could fish and swim.” His voice was limited to a whisper.
She placed one finger over his lips and he gave it a kiss. Her heart stuttered.
They pulled up to the hidden driveway and she recognized the two story home immediately. It was a mix of natural stone, wood, and shingle, with large plate glass windows facing the lake. It had always been owned by a wealthy and reclusive CEO from up north who used it as his private getaway in the wintertime. So she and Mason used to come out to swim and fish in the other seasons, especially when they wanted to take a break from school.
“Welcome to my home.”
“Your home?”
His grin was wide and full of secrets.
The girls jumped from the truck and Emma immediately tagged her sister and ran. Her dark brown ponytail swished back and forth. Anna Kate squealed and chased after her. Winston barked and ran between them as if he were a part of the game.
“What do you mean your home?”
“I may not have enjoyed being a stockbroker in New York, but it turns out that I have a knack for investing.”
“And you bought this property?”
“Come on.” He took her by the hand and walked her to the lake side of the home. She breathed deeply, happy to be away from the manor.
The giant oak extended over the water and a thick white rope swing hung from the longest branch. The girls ran up and down the dock, trying to figure out how to capture the rope and bring it to land.
“That is not the same rope swing—”
“No. I had a new one put in.”
With just a few steps along the soft grass, his countenance changed from stressed and fierce to relaxed. Happy. He breathed easier, as if the land and the lake and the house were all a part of him. His secret hideaway.
This wasn’t the first time they had held hands at this lake. Like revisiting an old photograph, she had been over and over that scene in her mind. Years ago he was so nervous when they were on the deck near the original rope swing. He had just cracked a joke about what she didn’t remember. But she did remember the look in his sweet ginger eyes and how he searched her face for just a flash of a moment before he took her hand.
“I can’t believe you bought this place.”
He shrugged. “This is where I spent many of the happiest days of my youth.” His smile broadened into the confident one she’d always loved, the one that said he’d captured the flag, won the race, and scored the winning touchdown. It was the smile that talked her into just about anything. She relaxed her guard in the presence of the emotional safety of friendship she and Mason used to share.
“We’re going to work this out,” he said.
“How?” she asked with a heavy exhale.
“I don’t know. Not specifically.” He ran his hand through his hair and stared at the lake. “I really thought I had gotten rid of her for good.”
“I thought I had as well.” Jordan’s presence in her life felt the same way Brooke’s always had—like she had tripped into some unexpected misfortune—a stomach virus, the flu or strep throat. She was the thing you didn’t expect, and yet she managed to effectively knock you down for longer than you thought possible.
“Do your girls swim?”
“Hmm?”
Mason pointed to her daughters who paced at the water’s edge. She had promised them a day of swimming and fun at the lake. “Oh, yeah. Like fish.”
“Then c’mon.” He pulled off his shirt and headed toward the lake. Along the way, he scooped Emma into his arms and jumped off the end of the pier with her squealing all the way, much to her sister’s giggling delight. Layla followed by taking a hand-holding, running jump with Anna. Their laughter bounced off the water and the surrounding forest, as if this were their own private world.
The water was cool but not cold, and it washed away some of the stress she carried. Watching the girls have fun with Mason took away more. They unofficially claimed him as their newest play toy by making him the center of their attention. Fortunately he had an easy way with them, matching their humor and their silliness with his own. She wasn’t sure who enjoyed the day more, her girls or Mason. Tonight, before she fell asleep, she would add the lake trip and Mason to her gratitude list.
The girls took turns positioning themselves on Mason’s shoulders while he lowered himself under water. Then he rocketed upward, sending them into a dive or a flip with a happy scream. She hadn’t seen her girls this happy in a very long time, and she knew he was everything Asher couldn’t be. The edges of her heart crumpled when she reminded herself that these good times with Mason wouldn’t last.
When the girls were ready for the rope swing, Layla was the first to demonstrate. She flew through the air with her arms stretched wide like a pro. In those two plus seconds before she landed in the water, she quickly realized why she reached for wings in her lucid dreams. It was this feeling that she wanted to recapture.
“Mama!” Emma squealed from her perch on top of Mason’s shoulders. “I didn’t know you could do anything like that!”
Layla bobbed weightless in the deep water, her smile as natural as the warm sun on her skin. “Honey, I’ve been flying like that long before you were born.”
The girls looked at one another with mouths open in total disbelief.
Layla swam to the center of the lake while Mason took the girls to the upper part of the grassy embankment with the rope swing in hand. She tread water and swatted away nibbling fish and watched while Mason gave the girls instructions.
His voice was calm, his demeanor was sweet, and his humor was dry enough to keep their attention engaged. She didn’t know if he was aware of it, but he had them in the palm of his hand. When they finally swung out to where their mother waited for them, they were full of smiles and screams of laughter. And when
they popped above water again they had a light in their eyes that showed them to be confident and strong. Mason had that direct effect on a person. He’d always had that effect on her.
She’d long thought that her happiest, most carefree days were far behind her, but leave it to Mason to find a way to bring them back, at least for one afternoon.
By the time the sun set, the girls were finally spent. They cleaned up in the outdoor shower, dressed in dry clothes, and Layla combed through their long wet hair.
“Mama?” Emma had a particular tone when she asked a delicate question and Layla heard it. It was higher, with just a touch of false sweet.
“Yes, baby.”
“Do you like Mr. Mason?”
Layla found herself nodding before she answered. “I do like Mr. Mason. Do you?”
“Yes,” she said at once and turned to face her mother with a smile. “I like him a lot.” She bit the side of one hot pink fingernail for a moment and then asked, “Is that okay?”
She tilted her daughter’s head back and kissed her on the forehead. “That’s absolutely okay. In fact, it’s downright good.”
“Are you sure? Because I don’t want to hurt Daddy’s feelings or make him angry.”
She noticed Anna listening closely to their conversation. “Daddy’s gone, sweetheart. You can’t hurt his feelings.”
The girls exchanged a look between each other.
Layla thought of the mug in the kitchen and Asher’s brief appearance in one of her dreams, and she quickly felt ill. “What’s going on? Girls?”
“I don’t think Daddy likes Mr. Mason like we do.”
“Why would you say that?”
Emma shook her head, indicating that she wasn’t going to answer.
Anna Kate cleared her throat. “Because on that night when you slept on the couch, we heard Daddy yelling.”
“You mean you were dreaming that he was yelling?” Layla didn’t find that clarification much more comforting.
A Murder at Alcott Manor Page 16
