Wish List (31 page)

Stacy Messina knocked on the edge of the door and poked her head in. She gurgled with laughter when she said, “Who is Miss Clara’s new beneficiary this time? Hey, I’ll fight you for those brownies.”

Jake grinned as he looked at his secretary. Stacy made coming to work easy. She was a short, buxom young woman with shoulder-length red hair that was so curly it looked like a mass of corkscrews. She was always early for work and the last one out of the office at night. Jake knew he was going to miss her when she left at the end of the summer to get married. ’The SPCA this time. You can have
one
brownie. You don’t want to lose that girlish figure and not fit into your gown, now, do you?”

Stacy was also defiant. She helped herself to two brownies. “Why so pensive, Jake? You looked like you were a million miles away. Is anything wrong?”

“No, nothing’s wrong. Miss Clara was talking about Trinity Henderson. I used to play with her. I was five years older, but they had horses out at the farm and I liked to ride and so did she. When you’re kids, age doesn’t matter. She could climb a tree better than me. I always fell out. She never did. She was a nice little kid. I had a really serious crush on her back then.”
Even now I can’t think about her without my heart quickening.

Stacy looked at her handsome boss. Six-two, curly black hair, eyes that were the color of cobalt and two of the most adorable dimples she’d ever seen. When he smiled he looked like a movie star. She’d told him that once, and he’d laughed his head off. “Was a nice little kid? Did something happen to her?”

“I was in college at the time but Dad said she ran away on her fifteenth birthday. As far as I know, she’s never come back. If she had, this town would have buzzed like a beehive. I don’t think anyone talks about it anymore. You were probably five or six at the time, so I can understand why you didn’t know her.”

“So, why was Miss Clara talking about her? Are they related or something?”

“No, nothing like that. Miss Clara said she went to the cemetery the way she always does and saw Sarabess Windsor there. It’s not important, Stacy. Get me the Merrill file. I need to do some work for Mr. Merrill. Type up the new will and make sure it’s ready tomorrow. Oh, Miss Clara said to tell Jocelyn that the tea was a tad too weak. You might want to correct that the next time you make it. She also said that making a tray of sweet tea ice cubes will prevent watering down the tea. How come you didn’t think of that?” Jake teased.

“Uh-huh,” Stacy said as she left the office, closing the door behind her. A second later the door opened again. “There’s a story about the runaway girl, isn’t there? You’re supposed to keep me apprised of everything. I am your secretary.”

“Go! There’s no story!”

The door closed.

Like hell there was no story, but he couldn’t dwell on it right now. He reached for the Merrill file and got to work.

Rifkin Forrest was early, so he settled himself down outside the restaurant on a weathered bench festooned with an old fishing net to wait for his son and to do a little people watching. He packed his pipe and fired it up. A fragrant puff of smoke circled upward. From time to time a customer would stop for a few seconds, and greetings were exchanged. Others would clap him on the shoulder, ask about his golf game, while still others would comment on the weather. Sometimes it was nice, Rifkin thought, to live in a town where everyone knew everyone else. Other times it wasn’t so nice. No matter, he would never leave Crestwood.

As Rifkin puffed on his pipe he did his best to concentrate on his golf performance earlier in the day, but his thoughts took him elsewhere. He didn’t want to think about the reason he was meeting his son for an early dinner. He also didn’t want to think about Sarabess Windsor, but he couldn’t clear his mind. He heaved a mighty sigh when he finally saw Jake cross the parking lot and head in his direction. How handsome he was. He was fit and trim because he worked out religiously. Right now he was mopping at the perspiration on his forehead. He had his mother’s finely chiseled features, her dark hair, her ready smile. He also had his mother’s gentleness, which wasn’t to say he didn’t get angry or belligerent; he did, but it never lasted more than a few seconds. With other people. Never with him. Jake hated his guts and made no secret of that hatred.

Rifkin gently knocked the tobacco from his pipe on the edge of the bench as he stood up to greet his son. He smiled. Jake grimaced.

“I’m here, let’s get out of this heat. I don’t have much time.”

“Excellent idea. How are you?”

“Miss Clara changed her will again today.”

“That’s hardly news. You busy?”

“Semi. June is always slow, you know that. I hope this impromptu dinner isn’t because you’re going to tell me you’re going away for the entire summer and leaving me with all your cases the way you usually do. We’re supposed to be a partnership. That means we share the load.”

Rifkin clapped his son on the back. He felt Jake flinch. “Now, Son, would I do that to you?”

Jake reared back. When his father used that particular tone of voice, he knew he wasn’t going to like whatever he was about to say. And, when he referred to him as
Son
as opposed to
Jake,
then Jake knew that whatever his father wanted to discuss was serious. Shit, he had his whole summer planned out. His lady of the moment, one Amanda Pettijohn, was not going to like this one little bit.

“Yeah, Rif, you
would
do that to me. You did it last year and the year before. So, you’re saying you aren’t going away for the summer, is that it?”

“No, Son, I am not going away for the summer. You are.”

Jake was saved from a reply as the hostess appeared and led them to a booth with a view of the canal. Rifkin waved away the menus. Both he and Jake always ordered the same thing when they dined at Backbay: pecan-crusted salmon, shoestring sweet potatoes, Miss Eva’s sweet pepper relish, and Backbay’s house salad with a pecan-grape vinaigrette dressing. Today would be no different. When the waiter appeared, Rifkin ordered their dinners and two bottles of Heineken.

Jake leaned across the table. “What? Where? We don’t have any pending business that requires travel. Do you have a new client? Look, I have plans for the summer. Send one of the paralegals to handle whatever it is that requires travel.”

“I would if I could . . .
Son.”

There it was again, that tone, and the term
Son.
Jake clenched his teeth. “But you can’t, is that it? Or is it that you won’t?”

“My client specifically asked for you to handle this matter. You’re the logical person, Jake. I think you’ll agree when I explain it all to you.”

Jake was pissed now. He reached for the bottle of beer the waiter handed him. He didn’t bother with a glass but started slugging from the longneck. That in itself should have been warning enough to the elder Forrest that his son probably wouldn’t be happy with what was coming. His father always made a toast to something or other when they dined together.

Jake let his eyes wander around the nautical decor of the restaurant. Suddenly he didn’t like the place. He made a mental note not to return anytime soon. “Who is this mysterious client of yours that thinks I’m the only one who can handle whatever it is that needs handling?”

Rifkin made a production of pouring his beer into a glass. He looked everywhere but at his son, instead concentrating on making sure the suds from the beer didn’t slosh down the side of the glass. “Sarabess Windsor!”

Jake’s face closed tight. “The answer is no, and further discussion is not negotiable,
Pop
. I refuse to discuss anything that has to do with Sarabess Windsor. If that’s what this dinner is all about, I’ll leave now and go to Burger King.”

“The least you could do, Jake, is show me the courtesy of listening to me. Let’s not create a scene. I’d also like it if you’d lower your voice.”

“Personally, Pop, I don’t give a good rat’s ass what you’d like. If you’re worried about how loud I’m talking, let’s not talk about it at all, and there won’t be a scene. Look, Pop, I understand you have feelings for Mrs. Windsor, have always had feelings for
that woman
even when Mom was still alive. I didn’t like it back then, and I still don’t like it. You really don’t want to go there with me. Maybe she can jerk
your
strings, but she sure as hell isn’t going to jerk mine. If you promised her my help, rescind that offer right now. I wouldn’t tell
that woman
what time it was if she was standing in a dark room. I think I’m going to go to Burger King after all. See ya, Mister Forrest.” Jake was greased lightning as he bolted from the chair and left the dining room.

Rifkin stared at his son’s back as he weaved his way through the tables to the exit. He’d known an explosion was going to happen, so why had he arranged the dinner? Because Jake was right—Rifkin had always been in love with Sarabess Windsor and could deny her nothing.

Now he had to concentrate on eating the dinner that was about to be put in front of him. Food that he knew would stick in his throat. Still, he couldn’t give the other diners something to speculate about. He looked up and smiled at the waiter as he set his food in front of him. “Jake had to leave. I’ll take his dinner to go and drop it off later.”

“No problem, Mr. Forrest.”

“I’ll have another beer if you don’t mind.”

“That’s not a problem, either, Mr. Forrest.”

Somehow or other, Rifkin managed to chew his way through his dinner. He wasted no time with dessert or after-dinner coffee. He stuck some bills under the saltshaker, picked up the to-go bag, and left the restaurant. His next stop: Sarabess and Windsor Hill. To report his failure—a word that wasn’t in Sarabess’s vocabulary.

Three

Jake did precisely what he had told his father he would: headed straight for Burger King on Bacon Ridge Road. He ordered two Whoppers, a Big Double Fish, fries, a milk shake, and a Coke before he headed to a parking space where he chewed his way through his fast-food dinner. He really had to stop eating this crap even though they said the burgers were flame-broiled, he thought, continuing to chow down on the fast food.

Now he had two things to think about tonight (three, if you counted Amanda Pettijohn): Trinity Henderson, the little girl from his past; and Sarabess Windsor, the woman his mother and his aunt Mitzi had hated with a passion.

As Jake munched his way through one of the two Whoppers he thought about his mother, who had died during his senior year in high school. Nola Forrest had been the sweetest, gentlest, kindest woman in the world. To his knowledge, his mother had never said an unkind word to or about another living soul. She’d loved all children and animals. He knew for a fact that she’d loved him with all her heart.

Their gardens, which his mother had planted and tended, had been written up in every Southern magazine in print. She’d taken him and his friends camping and didn’t mind sleeping in a tent, and she’d laughed about the creepy-crawly things that abounded in all campgrounds. She’d taught him to drive, taught him how to swing a baseball bat. She’d played tennis with him at least twice a week. Even though they’d had a cook and a housekeeper, his mother had cooked all his favorite foods one night a week. They’d laugh and giggle over the food that wasn’t good for them, but she’d justify it by saying they would double up on vegetables the rest of the week. The brownies that she made every Saturday morning were the best.

But she knew. How could she not have known? Everyone in town knew that Rifkin Forrest had
a thing
going on with Sarabess Windsor. However, no one in town, and that included his mother, knew if
that thing
had ever been acted upon. Jake thought it had, but he couldn’t prove it. Once, during his sophomore year, he’d gotten the courage to actually discuss with his mother what he considered his father’s indiscretion. She hadn’t put him off. Instead, she’d said rumors should never be repeated. Her eyes had been so sad when she said it.
Oh
,
yes, she knew.

When she’d gotten sick, she’d changed her will, leaving the entire Granger fortune, except the mansion, to him, in a trust that he couldn’t tap until he was thirty-five years of age. The mansion had come to him when he turned thirty. The remainder of the robust trust would be available to him in ten months. His father had been stunned and actually started proceedings to contest the will, but he hadn’t followed through once he read a letter his mother’s attorney handed him hours after the reading of the will. His father had never divulged the contents of the letter, nor had Jake asked. Things had changed after that, though. There was less spending money, his first car had been secondhand. He’d gone to a second-tier college, and his allowance had been meager. He’d worked to have extra spending money.

To say he and his father had a close, warm relationship would be a lie. They worked in the same office, had dinner occasionally, but they didn’t really socialize. They never called one another just to chat—there was nothing to chat about. As far as Jake knew, his father never went to the cemetery to visit or leave flowers on his mother’s grave.

His father still lived in the stately historical mansion that had once belonged to the Grangers of Crestwood. He himself had never gone back to the mansion after he graduated from law school. Instead, after his time in Albany, he found a three-bedroom apartment on the outskirts of Crestwood that suited him just fine because the owner of the complex said they accepted dogs. Not that he had a dog, but he was going to get one. Plus, he liked the window boxes and the colorful striped awnings over the windows. The window boxes and the flowers reminded him of his mother. Each renter was responsible for the flowers, something he took seriously. His window boxes were the prettiest, he thought smugly. When he was finally settled, he was going to go to the SPCA and adopt a dog.

He’d furnished the entire apartment with secondhand furniture and a few antiques he’d picked up at garage sales. If he had anything to say about it, he would never set foot in his mother’s old home even though it now belonged to him.