Liza wasn’t fooled. “The whole island knows, don’t they?” And she wasn’t talking about her injury.
“It’s all anyone can talk about.” Francine tossed a bag of chocolate peanut butter candies onto the table as she took a seat. “Speculation began on movie night, when the audience behind you was more fascinated by Kendall playing with your hair than Bogey and Bergman.”
Liza reached for her curls. “Kendall played with my hair?”
“Twirled that curl for a good half hour. Doreen claims that at one point he leaned in and took a sniff.” Francine ripped open the candies. “But that hasn’t been corroborated.”
Liza closed the laptop, not sure whether to be flattered or creeped out. “You people need hobbies.” She snagged the bag of chocolates Francine slid her way. “How would you feel if a gaggle of busybodies was gossiping about the intimate details of your love life?”
The older woman rolled her eyes. “There isn’t much to talk about there.”
“Really?” Liza unwrapped a candy. “You don’t think they’d be interested to know that you and Aadi Patel are an item?”
Francine froze. “What are you talking about?”
Suspicion confirmed. “I heard him in the background when I called you about Ray’s failing health.”
“Dang. I told him to stop talking.”
“He also smelled like you the next morning, and I doubt he uses lavender-scented shampoo at home.”
The bag of candy was pulled out of Liza’s reach. “What do you want, Teller?”
That chocolate, for starters. “Francine, why don’t you want people to know? I think it’s cute.”
The playful expression left her face. “Aadi’s wife was a big part of this community until she passed away three years ago. Everyone loved Sacchi. Heck, I loved Sacchi. But I’m nothing like her.”
Liza read between the lines. “In other words, you aren’t what? As worthy? As deserving?”
“As right for Aadi,” she replied with a sad smile. “He’s kind and smart and thinks I’m being absolutely ridiculous about all this, but I’m not ready to face the jury just yet.”
Now Liza knew how absurd her cocktail-party story must have sounded. “Screw the jury.”
Francine’s eyes went wide. “What?”
“Who cares what anyone else thinks?” Kendall was clearly rubbing off on her. “Do you like Aadi?” Liza asked.
“Well, yes, but—”
“I assume he likes you?”
“He says he does.”
“Then to hell with everyone else,” Liza declared, smacking her hand on the table for emphasis.
Francine stared in stunned silence for several seconds before bursting out laughing. “Where did that come from?”
Excellent question. “I’m not sure,” she replied, rubbing her stinging hand. “But I’m right. And so is Aadi. You’re being ridiculous.”
“Maybe I am.” She slid the chocolates back to Liza. “There’s a cookout at the Welcome Center this weekend. I assume you and Kendall will be attending together?” Liza nodded. “Then perhaps I’ll have a certain tall, dark, and brilliant doctor on my arm.”
Clapping her hands, Liza cheered. “That’s the spirit! Speaking of Kendall, do you know if my cart is here yet?” The battery hadn’t been charged enough for her to bring the vehicle home the day before, and Liza wanted to see a man about a house.
“That’s the other thing I’m supposed to tell you.” Francine rose from her chair and fetched a glass from one of the kitchen cupboards. “Your cart is dead.”
“My cart was dead,” Liza corrected, “but it should be charged by now.”
Francine popped the cork on her wine. “It wasn’t the battery, after all. Kendall worked on it all morning, and he can’t figure it out. I’m pretty sure he’s just going to buy you a new one.”
Surely he wouldn’t. “He can’t buy me a new golf cart.”
“Why not?” she asked, filling her glass and then bringing the wine with her to the table.
“Because carts can’t be cheap. I’m sure Ray will let me use his.”
The older woman lingered behind a chair. “What do you think Kendall does around here?”
Liza never had gotten a clear answer on that. “Handyman stuff, I guess. Odd jobs for whoever needs him.”
“So you think he doesn’t have a lot of money?”
“Not as much as everyone else, no.” Doubts creeped in. “Why are you looking at me like that?”
Lips pursed, Francine took her seat. “Darling, Kendall James is one of the wealthiest men on this island. He owns nearly a dozen rental properties, which is twice as many as anyone else. Do you know how much a rental goes for around here?”
Guessing, she said, “A few hundred?”
“Try a few thousand. A week. Twice that for the bigger units.”
“But . . . but he has the smallest house.”
“By choice, not necessity.” Francine lifted her glass into the air. “And from what I hear, the one he’s selling isn’t going for chump change, either.”
Though math was not her forte, Liza did some quick calculations in her mind and came up with a staggering sum. Even a rough estimate put him at seven figures a year.
Too stunned to be tactful, she said the first thing that came to mind.
“Holy shit. I’m dating a millionaire.”
Due to Liza’s sore foot, navigating her way down to Ray’s part of the house wasn’t the easiest task, but the show had to go on. After two days of rest that only shifted the pain from her foot to her bottom, Ray took the initiative to come to her. Liza had voiced concern about him climbing the stairs, only to be reprimanded that he might be as old as dirt, but he could still get around just fine.
His words. Not hers. And not the case the previous week, but she’d kept that reminder to herself.
They’d spent Wednesday morning moving from Ray’s newlywed days, which had involved transitioning from being young idealists to exhausted parents, through the birth of his son and the growth of his accounting career, all of which took place in the turbulent 1960s.
For Ray’s generation, such an enormous amount of social and emotional change in a relatively short span of time had threatened everything they understood about their world. What had been a given the decade before was no longer acceptable, and the future they’d envisioned, honed through the eyes of their parents, simply didn’t exist.
Writing this phase of Ray’s life would present the greatest challenge, because Liza’s perspective, looking back on the time period, differed greatly from that of the man who’d lived through it. Progress that brought long-overdue sweeping changes for society as a whole had felt like an attack on Ray’s way of life. Conveying his experiences and opinions without adding her own modern commentary was going to be a fine line to walk.
“We’re up to the ’70s, then?” Ray asked, clearing their lunch dishes and refilling Liza’s soda glass. She’d assured him the lunch mess could wait, but he’d insisted.
“We are.” She checked her trusty recorder to see that the light was still green. Once it turned red, she’d need to plug it in. “Your accounting business is up and running, and by this point your son is a teenager?”
Despite Ray’s previous insistence that nothing would be off-limits, he’d made the last minute decision not to go into detail about his son. Since their relationship was already strained, Liza agreed that this was likely for the best.
“Yes, that’s right. I’m not sure how much you know about the ’70s,” Ray began, “but the economy wasn’t great.”
Not a decade she’d thoroughly researched, but Liza knew that issues like inflation, unemployment, and soaring interest rates had hindered economic growth in the decade. “I’ve read about some of it, yes.”
“The bread and butter of my business were the mom-and-pop operations that had been serving New Yorkers for decades. When those businesses starting going under, so did mine.”
A frightening predic
ament to be in. “What did you do to stay afloat?”
Ray kept his eyes down, holding silent for several seconds. He resembled Amos when he’d gotten in trouble for leaping over Kendall’s coffee table. Ashamed and apologetic. “I had to make some hard decisions.”
A sense of dread rolled up Liza’s spine. “By hard, you mean . . . ?”
The older man crossed his arms. “I had to take whatever clients I could get. The mortgage wasn’t going to pay itself, and your . . .” He stuttered and then shook his head. “My son wanted to go to college. I needed to bring in money from somewhere.”
He made it sound as if . . . Liza recalled Kendall’s vague comments. “Ray, did you get involved in something illegal?”
The fedora shifted as he shook his head. “The only people making money in those days were the mob. They gave me the ability to take care of my business and my family, and all I had to do was make the books look legit.” He lifted his hands up and down as if he were weighing the options. “The money came through a plumbing-supply business, nightclubs, even convenience stores. I kept the books, and everything ran smoothly.”
Liza couldn’t believe her ears. Ray, a mobster? This kind, gentle spirit who’d served his country, adored his wife, and charmed every person he met was a bona fide criminal? He had to be joking.
“Are you sure they were mobsters?” she asked, convinced no one would believe this plot twist if she wrote it in a novel.
Ray had the wherewithal to look offended. “You know when you work for the Mafia, Liza. Dark suits. Enforcers. Black sedans parked outside your house at all hours, just to remind you that they’re always watching.”
When he put it that way, he wasn’t so much a mobster as an intimidated employee.
“Weren’t you afraid of getting caught by the authorities?”
“At that time in New York City, the mob was the authorities. They had everybody in their pockets. Police. Politicians. And the men in the mob were a hell of a lot scarier than any Goody Two-shoes with a badge.”
Ray sounded like a character out of Goodfellas. “Even more reason not to get involved. Did Essie know what you were doing?”
Pale lips curled into a snarl. “Not until the late ’80s, when the old dons started to die out and the next generation didn’t know how to keep their heads down. Those young punks didn’t know the meaning of the word honor.”
Liza marveled at the man before her, feeling as if she were interviewing a complete stranger. Instead of expressing relief that the criminals who’d always been watching him, as he’d put it, were dying off or being caught and prosecuted, Ray sounded angry that his lucrative clients were being condemned.
“Wait,” she said, realizing he’d jumped a decade. “You worked for these people for twenty years?”
“Eighteen,” he replied, as if wanting to get the details right. “Until I landed on the Feds’ radar in ’89. They came calling, offering me a lighter sentence if I’d turn on my bosses.”
“So you did it,” she said, relieved that the hero of her story was about to be redeemed. “You turned them in.”
Ray rose from his chair. “I don’t want to talk anymore today.”
Liza tried to rise, but pain shot up her leg when her heel hit the floor. “We can’t stop now. Ray, what did you do?”
He shook his head like a toddler refusing to eat his brussels sprouts. “I need to lie down. I don’t feel good.” Shuffling from the apartment, he pulled the door shut behind him, leaving Liza gaping at the table, stunned and distressed.
Did he turn them in or not? Of course, he did, she assured herself. If Ray hadn’t cooperated with the authorities, they wouldn’t be having this conversation today.
Would they?
Liza cursed her injured foot for keeping her from bounding down the stairs. She needed Ray to tell her the rest of the story. Except she knew from experience that Ray didn’t talk about anything until he was ready. That’s why it had taken two full weeks to get this far. And he still had three more decades to share.
After switching off the recorder, Liza closed her laptop, replaying the startling revelations in her mind. Ray said the authorities came knocking in 1989. That was . . .
“Holy freaking crap,” she mumbled. That was thirty years ago. The day she’d arrived, Ray had said he’d been on the island for thirty years, as of this fall. And according to Kendall, the James family had come with him. Was Kendall’s father involved in this mess? How could he not be if he’d worked for Ray and then followed him here?
Was this the secret that Kendall kept hinting at? Did she dare ask him?
No, Liza thought. Not yet. Not until she knew the rest of the story. She had to make sure Kendall’s father wasn’t the bad guy in all this. Or a bad guy, she corrected, since Ray had already placed himself in that category. Not that laundering money ranked as high as murder in the grand scheme of things, but still.
Ray Wallis worked for the mob. And in all probability, so had Kendall’s father. The implications raced through Liza’s mind. For Ray. For Kendall. For all of them if she wrote this book.
“Good Lord.” She breathed deeply, staring at her recording. “He put that on tape.”
Chapter 21
Between failing to fix the cart and the unreturned calls to Aunt Clarice, Kendall was not in the mood for company. The only reason he let Larimore in at all was because he was there on business.
“Unfortunately, we didn’t get the bidding war I’d hoped for,” he said, strolling to the kitchen, oblivious to Kendall’s dark mood. “But the higher offer still stands, so if you’re ready to do this, we have some details to finalize.”
Retrieving two beers from the fridge, Kendall set one on the table in front of the agent before letting Amos in the back door. “You read. I’ll nod.”
“That’ll work.”
As Larimore read through the list of inane details, Kendall filled Amos’s bowl, unloaded the dishwasher, and wondered who he had to bribe to get a new cart delivered to the island. He’d tried every dealer in Charleston—all three of them—and gotten quotes of two weeks or more. Liza would be gone by then, but in the meantime, she still needed to get around. And Ray could use the backup in case his gave out. Not that he drove himself around much anymore, but he needed the option.
“The final offer is two point two million.”
The number caught Kendall’s attention. “I thought you said two even.”
“That was before we threw in the furniture and the carts that go with the rental.” Flipping a page, he continued. “The buyer wants to close as quickly as possible, and after making sure their financing would hold up, I agreed to the terms.”
As quickly as possible meant that in a matter of weeks, the house his dad had built would no longer be his. Kendall’s gut turned as he fought the urge to call the whole thing off. He’d taken what he wanted. The rest was just wood and nails.
Larimore spread the papers on the table and held out his pen. “Sign and initial next to all the little tabs, and the deal is done.”
After drying his hands on a towel, Kendall reached for the pen as the phone in his pocket buzzed. Checking the cell, he said, “I need to take this.” Before accepting the call, he stepped onto the back porch. If this was bad news, he wanted to take it alone.
“Hey, Clarice. How’s she doing?”
“She isn’t nearly as annoyed as she should be after that high-and-mighty doctor made us wait all damn day.”
Kendall paced the length of the porch. “What did he say? Does she need surgery?”
“That’s the good news. He says the murmur isn’t long enough to indicate a major problem. They want her to get tested every six months, but they’re releasing her today, so we’re busting out of here soon.”
Tension eased from his neck. “Thank God. Let me talk to her for a minute.”
“Do I hear a please in there somewhere?”
“Please,” he mumbled, digging deep for patience.
“That’s bette
r. Here she is.” Clarice barked out orders about not damaging the flowers as she passed the phone over.
“I told you there was nothing to worry about,” his mother said in greeting. “I’m perfectly fine.”
“You still have a heart murmur, Mom. Make sure you keep up with those tests.”
“As if Clarice would let me miss one.” She had him there. “Thank you for the pretty flowers, son, but you didn’t need to do that.”
“Sure I did. I’m glad you like them.” Glancing into the kitchen, he said, “I wanted to let you know that I’ll be sending a good bit of money up there soon.”
“I’ve told you before—”
“I’m selling the house, Mom. Dad would want you to have the money.”
Silence lingered on the other end. “You’re selling the house that Christopher built?”
“I am. It’s going for a good price, so you can do whatever you want with the money.”
Kendall already made sure his mother didn’t want for anything, but this would put a nice chunk in her account. He hoped she’d use it to take that long trip to Europe she’d always talked about.
“I don’t know what to say, Kendall. I know you love that house.”
“You don’t have to say anything, Mom. Dad built it for you. It’s only right that you should have the money from it.”
In a rare acknowledgment of the past, she murmured, “He never understood that it wasn’t a house that I wanted.”
Clearing the lump in his throat, Kendall wished that the house could have been enough. “You let Clarice take good care of you, and I’ll call in a couple of days.”
“I love you, son.”
“Love you, too.”
Kendall stayed on the porch for several minutes after the call ended, wishing his mom wasn’t eight hundred miles away.
Chapter 22
Saturday dawned ugly and gray, with a downpour that Liza feared would wash out the Welcome Center cookout. Knowing Francine’s plan for the day, she wanted everything to be perfect, and the sun did not let her down. By noon, the clouds were gone, replaced by sunny skies, mild temperatures, and the typical warm ocean breeze that had stirred her curls every day since she’d arrived.
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