Small Town Girl
title page
Small Town Girl
Linda Cunningham
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Omnific Publishing
Dallas
Copyright Information
Small Town Girl, Copyright © 2011 by Linda Cunningham
All Rights Reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior written permission of the publisher.
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Omnific Publishing
P.O. Box 793871, Dallas, TX 75379
www.omnificpublishing.com
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First Omnific eBook edition, November 2011
First Omnific trade paperback edition, November 2011
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The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
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Library of Congress Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
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Cunningham, Linda
Small Town Girl / Cunningham, Linda – 1st ed.
ISBN: 978-1-936305-93-3
1. Contemporary Romance—Fiction. 2. Small Town—Fiction. 3. New England—Fiction. 4. Firefighter—Fiction. I. Title
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Cover Design by Micha Stone and Amy Brokaw
Interior Book Design by Coreen Montagna
This book is dedicated to the most fantastic group of Small Town Girls on the planet, The Ladies of ’69! They are Martha, Kathy, Jane, Joanne, Nancy, Elaine, Pat, Sharon, Marie, and Joni, each of them a romance in progress and a true inspiration.
L
AUREN
S
MITH
L
OOKED
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P
from her desk when she heard the knock on her office door. “Come in,” she said absentmindedly.
The door opened. It was Kelly, Lauren’s colleague at the museum. Lauren, as curator of the distinguished Thompson Museum for the Arts in the heart of Manhattan, was technically Kelly’s boss. However, as they had been best friends since they met in college ten years ago, this ranking was a formality generally ignored.
Kelly entered Lauren’s large and rather posh Curator’s Office, holding out a business-sized envelope to her across the desk. “The doyenne just handed this to me,” she explained. “It’s a registered letter. To you. It has the dreaded ‘Personal and Confidential’ stamp on it. They signed for it on your behalf.”
Lauren wrinkled her brow quizzically. “Hmm,” she said, accepting the envelope and turning it over in her hand, “I’m not expecting anything.” Smiling, she looked up at Kelly. “Maybe
The New York Times Magazine
wants to do a piece on the Thompson!”
Kelly made a sarcastic sound. “Bah! I looked at the sender. It’s some law firm from Vermont.” She paused, furrowing her brow in thought. “Vermont. We’re not affiliated with anyone in Vermont, are we?”
Suddenly, Lauren was not listening. At the word “Vermont,” her stomach gave a little nervous jump. She stared at the envelope. The law firm’s name was not familiar to her, but the name of the town was. Clarks Corner. Founded in 1790 by the Clark brothers, who emigrated from Scotland and became wealthy stonemasons in the New World. Lauren’s mother had grown up there. Her grandmother had lived there, too, but she had been dead for three years now. Lauren’s mother had inherited the house, but she and Lauren’s father had long since moved away. She couldn’t remember whether her parents had ended up selling the house, whether they had rented it, or whether it was just sitting there empty.
“What are you staring at it for?” urged Kelly. “Just open it!”
Lauren looked at her friend, twisting her mouth into a skeptical line. She picked up her silver letter opener, slipped the gleaming blade under the flap, and made one smooth motion. She reached in and gingerly withdrew the folded letter inside.
“Why are you acting so weird?” persisted her friend. “What does it say?”
Lauren swallowed and unfolded the letter.
“Well?” prompted Kelly.
Lauren scanned the document, took a deep breath, and began to read it aloud.
Dear Ms. Smith,
Upon probating your grandmother’s estate, we discovered a last will and testament in her name, stating her wishes regarding the distribution of the estate held by her at the time of her death. All assets, real and liquid, were forwarded to her next of kin, your mother, Mary Hamilton Smith, as per her wishes. However, we recently received a request from Mrs. Smith to transfer ownership of the real estate (parcel 4326–Town Tax Map 2008) to you. Enclosed is a copy of the transferred deed. Please feel free to call with any questions or comments you have on this matter. A key to the front door is enclosed for your convenience.
Sincerely,
Christopher Page, Esquire
Sweeney, Dillard, and Page
Attorneys-At-Law
“Well!” repeated Kelly, although this time as an exclamation. “They sent a key through the mail. Imagine that!”
“Leave it to my mother to do something like this and not even tell me about it,” muttered Lauren, staring down at the letter in her hands.
Kelly, always practical, said, “What does that mean? Why didn’t your mother tell you? Do your parents still live in San Francisco? Didn’t your mother ever say anything to you about changing the deed?”
Lauren stayed quiet for a moment, trying to ignore Kelly’s rapid fire questions and get her mind around this unexpected news. “My mother never said anything to me about it.”
“So exactly what did your grandmother have for real estate?”
“Just the house, I think. She died in the same house she’d always lived in. I spent a lot of my summers there with my grandmother when I was a child. I just took it for granted that my mother and father inherited everything.” Suddenly Lauren became agitated. “What do I want a house in Vermont for, anyway? That’s why I didn’t pay any attention to what became of my grandmother’s estate. I don’t care. I have everything I want here. This is where my life is. Not in Vermont.”
Kelly shrugged. “Well, it’s bound to be worth something. You can sell it. What kind of house is it? I never went there with you.”
Lauren suddenly felt somewhat guilty. Since she had gone away to college, her visits to her grandmother had become fewer and farther between. Lauren had been to Kelly’s family’s country house in Connecticut many times. It was a gracious brick Georgian home in Greenwich, close to New York. Kelly’s family was just what Lauren would have liked her family to be. Kelly’s father was a doctor, her mother a decorous homemaker with a perfect pageboy. Lauren couldn’t imagine what Kelly’s family might think of her own mother and father. They were hippies. They had spent their youth protesting for the cause du jour, leaving their only daughter with the gentle grandmother in Vermont. Now that they were older, they had moved to California where Lauren’s mother had become a potter. She wore her gray hair long, and her fingernails were often caked with clay. Lauren’s father was a musician — a fiddler, to be exact. He traveled around the country to different music festivals and gigs, and he gave lessons on the side. Whenever asked, Lauren would say that her mother was an artist or sculptor and her father was a teacher. She sighed. Thank goodness they lived on the West Coast!
“Hey!” said Kelly, breaking her colleague’s reverie. “Is the house worth anything?”
“Well, I assume so,” Lauren replied. “I better call these lawyers and find out what to do about it.” She stared at the letter and sighed. “I guess I’ll just have them put it on the market and sell it.”
“Don’t go turning over something like this to total strangers,” admonished her friend wisely. “You’ve got to go up there, Lauren. You’ve got to go there yourself and see to this personally. When was the last time you were there?”
Lauren thought, pausing before she spoke. “I went up for the day for my grandmother’s memorial service. So, I guess a little over three years ago.”
“And the house has been empty ever since?”
“Well, I guess so. I don’t know.”
“You’ll have to call your mother and find out what’s going on. I mean, property is property. You’ll have to see to it. Lauren, why are you so odd about your family?”
“How am I going to get away?” Lauren said absently, completely ignoring Kelly’s question. “What about Charles?”
Kelly’s voice became instantly cynical. “You can take a couple of days. I’m perfectly capable of seeing to things here at the museum. As for Charles, you could take a week’s vacation in Hawaii, come back, and he probably wouldn’t know you’d been gone! He leaves you all the time to do business all over the world — London, Singapore, Tokyo. You can certainly take a couple of days to go to Vermont. An engaged couple shouldn’t have that kind of double standard.”
“Kelly!” Lauren exclaimed angrily. “Don’t start on Charles!” Lauren’s choice of fiancé was the one bone of contention between the friends.
Kelly blew through her nose in exasperation but let the subject drop. “It’s only noon. Why don’t you run home, pack some stuff for a couple of days, and drive up to Vermont. I’ll keep an eye on things. Call Charles and let him know what’s going on. Is he even in the city?”
“Yes, he’s home,” answered Lauren. It was one of the reasons she didn’t particularly want to leave New York. Charles wasn’t home very often, and their time together was important to her. She glanced down at the large diamond on her left hand. After all, they had a wedding to plan.
“Really, Lauren, it’s the responsible thing to do.”
Lauren gave a resigned sigh. “I suppose you’re right. I guess it won’t take long. I’ll just list it with a Realtor and let them handle it. I don’t really care.”
“You should get going. Go home. Stuff some things in an overnight bag. Don’t forget your toothbrush. You should get out of the city before the commuter traffic starts. It should only take you four hours or so to get there. You can get there before dark.”
Lauren hugged her bright-eyed friend. “You always look after me!”
An hour and a half later, with her friend’s assurances and encouragement, Lauren found herself crossing the New York-Connecticut border, traveling north on Interstate 95 in the smart little Mercedes Charles had bought her last Christmas. Once on the interstate, Lauren reluctantly activated her Bluetooth and called her parents in California. Her mother answered.
“Mom?”
“Lauren! What a nice surprise!”
“Mom, why didn’t you tell me you deeded Gramma’s house to me?”
Her mother’s hearty laugh nearly split Lauren’s eardrum. “Surprise! Your father and I had no idea what to give you for a wedding present. You seem to have everything imaginable. So we gave you Gramma’s house. Perhaps you and Charles would like it as a summer place. Either that or you can do whatever you like with it.”
“Oh, Mom,” said Lauren, chagrined. “You didn’t have to do that. Can’t you and Dad use the money? You could sell it.”
“Oh, we don’t need anything, honey,” said her mother. “And Gramma loved you so much. She would want you to have it.”
“Well, ah, thank you so much, Mom. Actually, I’m on my way up there now to look the place over. Thanks, Mom, and thank Dad for me, too.”
“I will, honey, I will. You drive carefully now. I love you. See you soon.”
“I love you, too, Mom,” Lauren replied. “See you soon.”
