Chapter 28

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Luke

I ’d had a glass or two of beer to wipe the evening away. I was usually confident and sure about my life, but I felt as if I’d been tossed around on a sinking ship on a stormy sea, and I had no idea which direction I was headed. A loud voice had woken me from a deep sleep. Now that I was awake, I recognized the voices.

“If you’re so fond of him, then why don’t you marry him, Mother?”

I pulled on my shorts and a shirt and hurried to the stairs. Rachel and Mom were standing at the bottom. Rachel’s face was streaked with tears and red in anger, and Mom was trying to calm her down with unwanted and unsolicited snippets of advice.

“I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation for it,” I heard Mom say.

“Yes, it’s very reasonable, actually. David has been sleeping with a member of the catering staff. There. Reasonable enough for you?” Rachel took a big bite of the cake slice she held tightly in her fist. I hadn’t seen her wedding cake, but something told me she’d ripped a big chunk off of it. Cake crumbs flew everywhere.

Dad was suddenly in the scene, talking in a low, commanding voice. “Let’s take this in the study. We don’t need the guests to hear. We’ll talk this through. Where is David?”

“Oh, what’s the matter, Dad? Are you worried his feelings were hurt when I told him to drop dead?”

I hurried down. Rachel needed an ally.

“Luke, this doesn’t involve you,” Mom said.

“Rachel is my sister, so yes, it involves me.” I smiled at her. “Did you finally dump the jerk?”

“Sure did.” She took another bite of cake and then held the rest out to me. “Cake?”

“Think I’ll skip it.”

“Rachel, you’re acting like a child,” Mom said. “Put the cake down.”

Rachel smashed the last piece into her mouth, leaving crumbs and icing all over her face and shirt. She held out her empty hand like a child to show that she’d finished the whole piece.

I looked at Dad. He was fidgeting with the ends of his vest and looking everywhere but at his daughter. He’d been behind this match. Usually, it was Mom, but this time it was all on Dad. It was a marriage that was advantageous to the company, and that was his sole motive.

“Well, Dad,” I said. “What do you think now? That boring-as-a-rock man has just cheated on your daughter. Do you really want her in a marriage where people gossip and giggle behind her back as her husband goes through a parade of mistresses? Are company profits more important than Rachel’s happiness?”

“I told you this is none of your business, Luke,” Mom said. I ignored her.

Dad still had his face and eyes down, avoiding eye contact.

“Let’s call David down from his room, and we’ll all have a nice talk over a cup of coffee,” Mom suggested cheerily as if the whole drama was merely about what colors to paint the new house. “We need to hear David’s side of the story.”

Rachel pulled out her phone, licked her cakey finger and ran it over the screen. She pushed it abruptly in Mom’s face. “Here’s the picture I took before David knew I was in the room. That’s his side of the story—his backside.”

Mom’s face paled. “Please get that phone out of my face.”

“Well, Dad?” Rachel held the phone up to him. He lifted his face to look at it.

“Amy!” he shouted suddenly, startling us. “I know you’re lurking around the corner listening to this. Please, join us.”

It took her a few seconds to come out of hiding. Her cheeks were red. “Yes, sir?”

“Please go upstairs and tell David to pack his things and be off my property in the next fifteen minutes or I will call the police.”

Amy was my mom’s personal assistant. The two rarely made a move without checking with the other first. She looked at my mom. “Do as he says,” Mom muttered.

Rachel walked over to me and dropped into my arms, smearing my shirt with cake crumbs and a smudge of frosting. Dad walked back to the solitude of his office. “I’m sorry Isla left,” Rachel mumbled against my chest. “I liked her. She was the one who let me know that David was in the pool house. I guess I have her to thank for saving my future.”

“Of course, she had her hand in all this,” Mom said snidely. “And with this catastrophic end to the weekend, the Carltons will probably want nothing more to do with us.”

Rachel peered up at me with red swollen eyes. “Sounds like this worked well in more ways than one, because if you ever decided to marry, or even date, that horrid Alexandria, you and I would become estranged siblings.”

“And now that you’re not marrying David, we can still hang out. In fact, I think you should get a place near me. It’ll do you good to get out of here.” Then something hit me. “Wait, did you say Isla left?”

“She certainly did,” Mom said. “I immediately went up to her room to make sure she didn’t take the jewels with her. Surprisingly, she left them behind.”

“That’s because not everyone thinks like you, Margaret.” Hazel was making her way down the staircase. I hurried up the stairs to help her the rest of the way down. “I assume you took my necklace and earrings.”

“I put them somewhere safe where they can’t be lent out to just any stranger who walks through the door,” Mom explained.

“So, you stole them?” Hazel asked.

Rachel snickered behind her hand.

“You really are getting old and batty, Hazel. Perhaps we need to start looking for a nice, quiet home for you.”

“You do that, Mom,” Rachel said, “and none of us will ever talk to you again. I’m going to buy a place near Luke, Grandma. I’ll make sure it’s got a nice room with a view for you.”

Hazel smiled. “I’d like that.” She turned to Mom. “And I’d like my jewelry back. I’m ready to give it to Rachel. They were going to be my wedding present, but I think this is a bigger reason to celebrate. That boy was never worthy of my Rachel.”

Rachel threw her arms around Hazel.

“That’s ridiculous. Those jewels are meant for the woman of the house. As Marcus’s wife, they should go to me.”

“You will never, ever wear that necklace, Margaret. Now, have Amy bring them to my room at once.” Hazel reached up and pressed her hand against Rachel’s cheek. “I’m sorry that you had to go through this, Rachel, but I think this all turned out for the best.” She turned to my mom. “You’d better start changing your ways before these children leave you for good. Now start making those calls. You’ve got a wedding to cancel.”

Mom stormed off in tears. I headed upstairs to the guest rooms. I was holding out a slim bit of hope that Isla hadn’t really gone for good. Maybe Mom misread the whole thing. I knocked, but there was no answer. I opened the door and stepped inside.

The bed quilts were rumpled, and the pillows sat in a mound next to the bed. I walked to the armoire and pulled open the doors. She’d left behind the dress. I supposed it held too many bad memories. I walked over and kicked the pile of pillows in frustration. They flew across the floor. Isla’s short boot, the one she wore during her unforgettable performance, sat alone on the floor. I picked it up. It was so small in my hand, and everything about it reminded me of Isla.

I hurried downstairs and ran into Amy. She looked shaken. Dad should have told David to leave himself and not sent Amy for the task, but that was his usual way. Don’t perform a task if you can order someone else to do it. I never wanted to be like that. “Amy, did you happen to see where Isla went this morning? Did someone come and pick her up?”

“As far as I know she didn’t go through the main gates. She must have left through the service gate.”

“Right. Thanks.” I hurried outside and ran along the path to the service gate. Ryan, one of the groundskeepers, was guiding in a landscaping truck filled with white roses. The wedding preparations were still in full swing. It would take some time to bring them to a screeching halt.

“Hey, Ryan, did you happen to see a young woman with light blonde hair and so high?” I lifted my hand to my chest. I knew exactly where she landed when she was in my arms and I could still feel her pressed against me on the dance floor, breathing in her sweet scent and feeling how right she felt in my arms.

“Yes, she stepped outside the gates. A car came and picked her up, an Uber driver, I think.”

“When did they leave?” I asked urgently.

“Been about thirty minutes.”

I was devastated. Thirty minutes was a good start.

“I heard her mention the Granville Bus Depot to the driver,” Ryan added.

“Granville, that’s about an hour from here, right?”

“I’d say so.”

“Thanks, Ryan. And by the way—the news hasn’t reached out here yet, but the wedding is cancelled.” I left a very speechless groundskeeper behind as I ran back to the house.

Rachel was sitting by the big fountain at the front of the house, texting. The earlier look of despair was gone, and she looked relieved about how things had turned out. She spotted me rushing out with my keys. “Interested in a drive to Granville?”

“Only if you’re chasing down Isla.”

“I sure am. Climb in.”

“ L ovely day for a wedding,” Rachel joked as we pulled onto the highway.

“How are you feeling?”

“Relieved but also angry at myself for letting it get this far. As much as I’m loathe to admit it, you were right, big brother, David wasn’t fine . He and I were never a match. Dad and his amazing salesmanship sold me on the whole idea, and I thought what the heck? It wasn’t as if I was doing any better on my own.”

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” I mused. “What about Art Greer, the singer for that weird punk band?”

“All right, I was nineteen. Shall we start listing some of your less savory choices as well?”

“No, let’s leave the past in the past. Seriously though, I’m glad you found out before it was too late.”

“Me, too.” Rachel leaned the seat back. “I got up at the crack of dawn to see if I could run off another pound before I had to squeeze into the dress.” She sat up for a second. “If you see a Taco Bell, pull off. I’ve got a lot of lost calories to make up.”

“Not until I get to the bus depot.”

Rachel wriggled into a comfortable position. “You really like this woman. And I can’t think of the last time I said those words to you.”

I stared ahead at the highway as it stretched between slabs of mostly empty landscape. “I do like her, a lot. And same here—I can’t remember the last time I said those words. At first, I thought I was feeling guilty about dragging her into this long weekend. Mom was really at the top of her game, too. She accused Isla of stealing Grandma’s necklace and in front of everyone. I sensed that became a final straw for Isla. She’d been fighting off Mom’s constant assaults with grace and wit, but that was one step too far. You missed it last night, but Isla, somehow decided that I was starting up something with Alexandria.”

Rachel’s head popped up. “You weren’t, right?”

I shook my head. “No, she wasn’t my type.”

“Thank god,” Rachel sighed. “For about three seconds, after I met her, I thought maybe she’s not too bad, maybe Mom picked the right person this time, but it didn’t take long for that botox-filled facade to peel away.”

“I agree. She was persistent and forward and frankly, annoying. After the big breakup scene?—”

Rachel sat up, straining against the seatbelt. “The what?”

“I forgot—you went to bed early. Isla pretended to break up with me, loudly and on the dance floor, so that I wouldn’t look like a total jerk and I could move on with Alex.”

Rachel shook her head. “Oh, give this up. She’s way too good for our world.” Her phone beeped for the hundredth time. She turned it off and threw it on the floor between her feet. “I blocked him, but his friends and family keep texting and calling. I guess it’s going to be a while before the scandal and shock of this dies down. That’s what I hate about being in this family. Why can’t I just cancel a wedding, post some pictures of my cheating man on the internet and eat a pint of Ben & Jerry’s like a normal woman?”

I laughed. “Did you post those pictures?”

“Wouldn’t you?”

I nodded and lifted my hand for a fist bump. She settled back against the seat. “Now, about that ice cream—doesn’t have to be Ben & Jerry’s, though that would be a bonus. If you see a mini-mart or something ... Never mind. You’re a man on an important mission. My carb overload can wait.” She yawned and closed her eyes. “Never realized how tired cancelling a wedding can make you. Wake me for the big ending scene where the man stands in the bus depot with his arms out letting the woman know he loves her and can’t live without her.”

“I’ll wake you for the good stuff.” Rachel slept as I mulled many different speeches over in my head. Then I realized all I needed was Rachel’s big ending scene. I needed to let Isla know that I couldn’t live without her. I looked up at myself in the rearview mirror. Was it true? Was that how I felt? “You stupid jerk. How’d you let her go in the first place?”

“Because you’re a Greyson and we tend to be stupid. Obscenely wealthy and stupid, and that’s never a good combination,” Rachel muttered.

I pulled off at the Granville exit. Rachel pushed the seat up when she realized we’d reached our destination. I glanced at my phone’s map app and turned left toward the bus depot. The parking lot was empty, and the depot was too. I raced to the ticket counter. “Hello, did you see a petite blonde woman with a suitcase that was covered in stickers?”

The guy behind the counter nodded. “She’s gone. The bus left about a half hour ago. It was on time for a change.”

“Figures. Thanks.”

Rachel had reached the depot building. “Well?”

I shook my head.

“Well darn, I really needed that happy ending today.” She reached me and gave me a hug. “You know what you have to do now?”

“Drive to her hometown and find her,” I said.

“Right. That, too. But first, you need to find me that ice cream.” She smiled up at me and I realized she looked happier than I’d seen her in months. “Don’t blame me for my selfishness. It runs in the family, unfortunately.”