Uncharted (11 page)

“What’d you expect?” Susan gave her a bittersweet smile. “I couldn’t believe it when I heard. How crazy is this? I would have picked David as the least likely to die in a car crash.”

Karyn swallowed hard. “Sometimes accidents happen. Have you heard any details?”

“I heard a couple talking outside. Apparently David went off the road and hit a tree. They’re not sure, but the police think someone may have swerved toward him, maybe even forced him off the road. He had a perfect driving record.” Pain squeezed Susan’s heart until she could barely speak. “He always was . . . careful.”

Karyn’s chin quivered. “I hate this, but I’m so glad to see you. On the flight I kept hoping everyone else would come.”

“I couldn’t stay away.” Susan took Karyn’s hand and squeezed it. “I suppose Kevin is a pallbearer. Did you two drive over from New York?”

Karyn blinked. “You . . . you don’t know?”

“Know what?”

Sadness struggled with humor on Karyn’s fine-boned face. “We’ve been divorced for ten years. I don’t know if he’s here or not.”

Susan caught her breath, not sure how to respond. She regretted the pain they must have endured, but after ten years, should she express sympathy or congratulations?

“You . . .” She searched for the right words. “You have a daughter, right? Any other children I never heard about?”

Karyn laughed. “Sarah’s the best thing—maybe the only good thing—to come out of our marriage. She lives with me during the week and spends a couple of weekends a month with Kevin. She spends up to six weeks in Atlanta during the summer.”

Susan nodded, trying to absorb this startling information. “He didn’t press for custody? Is it because his new wife—”

“Kevin hasn’t remarried.” The glitter in Karyn’s eyes brightened. “He doesn’t want Sarah more than twice a month because he’s too busy playing corporate games. I’d say Sarah’s lucky he takes time to be a father at all, but that wouldn’t be fair. He does love her. But he’s always had trouble making time for the things he loves.” She tilted her head as the grim line of her mouth relaxed. “What about you? Have you remarried?”

Susan shook her head. “It’s a little crazy in Houston; the only men who seem to be interested in matrimony are those who need a quick infusion of cash.”

Karyn released the low and throaty chuckle of an actress. “I heard you married money.”

“Don’t believe everything you hear. But yes, Charles was wealthy. And I loved him.”

When Karyn tilted a brow, Susan deepened her smile. “I promise I did.”

“I believe you. You could’ve had any man you wanted in college, and I’m sure you still could—”

“You’d be wrong.” Susan took her friend’s arm and nodded toward the open doors. “I know we have a lot of catching up to do, but we’d better go in. Sit with me?”

“Love to.”

They proceeded through the entry under the watchful gaze of two blue-suited ushers, then slipped into a crowded pew at the back of the rectangular room. The organist was cranking out “Nearer My God to Thee,” and Susan was surprised to find the words flowing through her brain even though she hadn’t visited a church in months.

They sat in silence, stifling their conversation for David’s sake. Susan had come to pay her respects and acknowledge the role David had played in her life, but seeing her old friend awakened a host of feelings she’d thought long dead. Karyn would never understand that the beauty that had singularized Susan in college continued to insulate her now. The only men who dared approach were brash, overconfident fools. Good men like Kevin Carter and David Payne tended to remain aloof.

Still . . . Karyn had said she was as lovely as ever. That comment alone was worth the price of a dozen plane tickets.

The gray rain had begun to slow by the time Lisa handed the cabdriver two twenties. “Keep the change,” she muttered, remembering that she had a perfectly good umbrella at the bottom of her overnight bag.

As usual, she had arrived late and unprepared. She ran through the rain, one hand ineffectually shielding her hair. An usher inside the building opened the door, then handed her a program as she attempted to shake water from her hair.

The usher gestured to a small room off to the side. “Perhaps you’d like to leave your bag in there?”

“Thank you.” She set her luggage inside the cloakroom, then paused to check her reflection in a mirror by the door. Her hair was wet and stringy, her makeup smudged. The long flight—delayed eight hours by storms in the Midwest—had done her no favors.

The chivalrous older man who helped her at the door gestured to the open doors of the auditorium. “There are a few empty spots near the back,” he whispered.

Lisa slipped into the crowded sanctuary, then noticed a narrow gap between a man and a woman sitting on a rear pew. She moved forward and stood at the end of the aisle, feeling terribly conspicuous until the mourners took the hint and slid over.

Gratefully, she sank into the seat and focused on her program. The man speaking at the pulpit was a Bostonian, if his accent could be trusted. He could be a friend delivering a eulogy, or perhaps he’d been one of David’s coworkers . . .

No, she realized, reading the program. The fellow had to be Randall Atchinson, pastor of Boston Community Fellowship. He was reading Scripture, though the words were far more conversational than any Bible she had ever read.

“Don’t let your heart be troubled,” he read. “You are trusting God; now trust in me.”

She inhaled a deep breath and released it slowly as she studied the backs of strangers’ heads. Had her friends come? If not, she wouldn’t know a soul in this place.

She bit her lip when she spied two women sitting three pews ahead. The blond might be Susan, and the woman next to her
could
be Karyn. They were sitting close together, shoulders rubbing, as two dear friends might if determined to share a heavy grief.

Karyn wouldn’t sit with Kevin, of course, because he would almost certainly be a pallbearer. He was probably up front, one of those dark heads behind the widow.

She closed her eyes and wished she could squeeze into the pew with Karyn and Susan. But she didn’t dare make a scene. She’d talk to them after the service, perhaps at the wake. She’d find the guys too. She’d give anything to see what had become of Mark and Kevin—

She glanced at the program, then blinked at the next name on the list of speakers: John Watson. The old man was still
alive
?

She lifted her gaze to the platform, where Watson was climbing into the pulpit. He was grayer now, and thinner in the face, but he was still tall and lean and powerful.

Her chin trembled as a crowd of memories came rushing back. Twenty years ago John Watson had a reputation for eccentricity, but he had always been kind to her. Several times during her lean college years he gave her money, calling it an advance when they both knew she could never sell enough books to pay him back. “The world needs good teachers,” he once told her when she protested. “You’re going to be a great one.”

The flesh on her forearms contracted in a shiver when the man of her memory merged with the rumbling voice at the microphone.

“I remember meeting David Payne for the first time,” Watson said, stroking the sides of the pulpit as he leaned toward the crowd. “The year was 1981. I had placed an ad in the
Tallahassee Democrat
, calling for students who wished to make extra money during the school year. David Payne was one of two dozen students who responded and one of six who stuck around after hearing my presentation. That day, and the weeks and months following, changed my life. I daresay they also changed David’s.”

Lisa felt a shiver race up her spine. How long had it been since she’d thought of that eventful day?

17

Karyn nudged Susan when John referred to their first meeting. Despite the windy, wet weather outside, she could close her eyes and almost feel the heat of the Florida sun.

Like the others, Karyn had answered the ad in the hope of making a little extra money for school. Kevin, whom she’d just met outside the dorm, didn’t need money, but he went with her to the Best Western. Karyn interpreted his willingness to keep her company as evidence of genuine interest, if not affection.

They met John Watson in the lobby of that slightly seedy motel. Tall and wiry, he wore denim jeans and a zippered knit shirt—not at all the dress of a professor, even in the eighties. He didn’t look wealthy, either, but she sensed strength in him as he went around the circle and personally greeted each of two dozen students who showed up to hear his presentation.

Karyn had been intrigued.

After offering a plate of chocolate-chip cookies and a round of sodas, Watson stood in the center of the lobby and laid out his proposition: he had written a book, he told them, a simple story imbued with the power to change lives forever. Unable to find a traditional publisher, he had self-published the tale and was determined to distribute it as widely as possible.

He held up a copy of the slim blue volume and flashed its title:
Happily Ever After
.

“This is where you come in.” He smiled as he dropped the book onto a coffee table and thrust his hand into a pocket of his black jeans. “The book retails for $14.00, but I’ll give you seven bucks for each copy you sell. That’s enough to keep you in pizza and soda if you work steadily through the semester. You can set your own hours and work as little or as much as you like. To put your customers at ease, I offer a money-back guarantee. All you have to do is offer the book to folks, tell ’em how much it costs, and promise it’ll change their lives. The only time I’ll require of you is a short monthly meeting where we can talk about how the work’s going. That’s it.”

Karyn glanced around the lobby, wondering if any of the others were taking this guy seriously. The setup sounded fishy, and her father had always said anything too good to be true probably was.

“I’m going to go upstairs and grab a couple of boxes of books,” Watson finished, rubbing the small of his back as if the idea of lifting boxes pained him. “If this isn’t your cup of tea, you can slip out and no hard feelings. But if you would like to give this project a shot, stick around. I’ll give you as many books as you want, and you can start selling whenever you like.”

Even back then, Kevin had been worried about his bottom line. “So what do
we
pay for the books? How much do you want to cover your start-up costs?”

Watson gave Kevin a quick gleaming look, then laughed. “I work on the honor system, son. I don’t take a penny from you; I only ask that you send me half the proceeds after you sell a book. You can wait and deliver a lump sum at the end of each month if you want.”

Kevin’s eyes narrowed to a challenging squint. “Sounds like a crazy way to do business.”

Watson propped one boot on a scarred coffee table and rested his hand on his knee. “It may be crazy, but it works for me. I don’t need a regular income, you see. As far as I’m concerned, anything that comes in is gravy. I care more about getting the story out than making a useless fortune.”

“Then why don’t you
give
the book away?”

Karyn felt the astringent sting of jealousy as every eye, including Kevin’s, turned in the direction of that soft Southern voice. The girl who spoke was easily the most beautiful female Karyn had ever seen; the type who left garrulous professors speechless and earned A’s for reasons that had little to do with coursework.

Even Watson’s face brightened when he paired the question with the questioner. “I don’t give the book away,” he said, “because nothing in life is free. I’ve found people tend to undervalue things that are simply handed to ’em. When I charge a fair price, people expect a fair deal.”

His blue eyes left the blond and swept over the gathering. “If there are no other questions, I’ll go get those books. I’ll be right back.”

The minute Watson disappeared into the elevator, most of the students got up and left, cracking jokes and complaining about wasted time. Karyn stayed because she needed money for living expenses; her scholarship only covered books and tuition. Kevin stuck around because she did. The blond beauty waited, and so did a studious-looking girl who wore her hair in a ponytail so tight her face seemed stretched. Besides Kevin, only two guys lingered in the lobby—a thick-necked, athletic type who would later introduce himself as Mark Morris, and a serious young man in a T-shirt and jeans.