The Summerhouse

by Jude Deveraux

  At that Thomas’s eyes widened in surprise.

  “Yes, my sister,” Brooke continued. “Dr. Dorothy Oliver. You do remember her, don’t you?”

  Thomas stood still, ignoring his mother’s sarcasm.

  Frank stepped forward and put himself between his son and wife. He was the peacemaker in the family. “To us, this visit was just a normal thing of Scotty’s asking his old college friend to visit, but it seems that there was a lot that we didn’t know. Over two years ago when Roger was first injured, it seems that he called Scotty, as Scotty had mentioned that he had an aunt who worked with physical therapy. Roger told Scotty that he needed ‘the best.’”

  “Which you know that my sister is,” Brooke said in pride.

  “Yes, but . . .” Frank hesitated and looked at his wife. “Roger’s parents are . . .”

  “Skinflints,” Brooke said. “I’m sorry to say it, but they are. What they did is . . . Well, it’s abominable. You tell it, Frank, or I’ll get too angry.”

  “It seems that Roger’s parents consulted with your aunt Dot about their son’s massive injuries. They even flew Dot out to Montana, but after she told them what was needed to rehabilitate their son, and even then he might never walk again, and—”

  “And how much it was going to cost,” Brooke added. “They told my sister, ‘Thank you, but no thanks.’ Dot said that it was six months before they paid her consultation fee.”

  Thomas knew that his parents were going somewhere with this story, but he couldn’t guess where.

  At times like this, when Brooke was so angry, it could be seen where her son got his scowl. “Dot thinks that Roger’s parents encouraged their son to call his old girlfriend, Madison—a girl he had crassly jilted, by the way—and beg her to return to Montana, just so she could be his free nurse. She’d had previous nursing experience, so they knew she could do the job.”

  For a moment his parents were silent, and Thomas knew that he was to see something that he wasn’t seeing. “So?” he said.

  “So she did it,” Brooke said. “That poor girl went back to Roger, married him, and has spent that last couple of years doing nothing but rehabilitating him.”

  Thomas hadn’t graduated from medical school yet, but he had been interested in the extent of his brother’s friend’s injuries at the time, and he’d found out about them. Thomas knew the monumental amount of labor that must have been done to get Roger up on canes in a mere two and a half years.

  Thomas gave a low whistle under his breath. He was impressed.

  “Right,” Frank said. “And during the rehabilitation, it seems that young Madison and your aunt became friends. Three times Dot and her family flew out to Montana on vacation, and she always spent as much time as possible with Madison.”

  “Smart,” Thomas said. “That way she could deduct most of the trip.”

  Frank narrowed his eyes at his son in warning; then he continued. “Your aunt thought it was unethical to tell us about her clients, so we never knew any of this. However, Dot saw that her friend needed—and deserved—a holiday, so she planted the idea in Scotty’s head to invite his old friend Roger here to the cabin. Of course your aunt never dreamed that Roger wouldn’t have told Scotty about his marriage. The idea was to give Madison some time off—a rest.”

  “I see,” Thomas said softly. “But now I have changed the situation.”

  “So what do you propose can be done to change it back?” Brooke asked her son, her eyes narrowing into slits that resembled his.

  “I will apologize to her, of course,” Thomas said. “It was really just a misunderstanding anyway. She was . . .” Now that he thought about it, her explanation that she had slipped behind a cupboard to escape being seen so she could go fishing early made sense. The truth was, Thomas had often climbed out his bedroom window in order to evade all the people his parents invariably had at the cabin, just so he could get to his favorite fishing hole early. “It will be a heartfelt apology.”

  “And then what do you think she will do?” Brooke asked.

  Thomas looked surprised. “I have no idea. I don’t know the woman. I assume she’ll unpack and . . . and do whatever it is that women like to do.”

  Brooke shook her head at her son. How could he have lived this long and know so little about women? “Let’s see. She came here thinking she was an invited guest. But she found out that her husband hadn’t told anyone that she was coming. Actually, he hadn’t even told anyone he was married. Your sister, your cousin, and their little friend Robbie have done nothing but look down their noses at her since she arrived because, as even you have probably noticed, Madison is beautiful enough to make a goddess jealous. Then she—”

  “Venus.” When his mother squinted her eyes at him in disapproval for his having interrupted, he said, “Botticelli’s Venus.”

  “Well, I am glad you noticed,” Brooke said sarcastically. “In addition to the abominable way my other guests have treated her—as well as that philandering husband of hers—I find that my eldest son has done something so intolerable that she is now asking to leave. If it wouldn’t be too much to ask, could you please tell me what you said to her?”

  Thomas looked down at the floor. His shoes needed to be polished. He looked back at his mother. When he was a child, she was the only person on earth who had ever been able to frighten him. And right now he felt about four years old and that he’d just done something he shouldn’t have. “Blackmail,” he said softly.

  “I beg your pardon,” Brooke said, her voice full of disbelief.

  I should have studied law, Thomas thought. Maybe if he had, he’d be able to think of a clever defense of himself, but medicine didn’t prepare one for defenses. He put his shoulders back. “It was a natural mistake to make,” he said. “I thought that she was probably—”

  Brooke put up her hand to cut him off. “I can’t bear to hear this. That lovely girl, and you . . . you . . .” Stepping backward, she sat down on a heavily padded club chair, and when she looked up at her son, she looked as though she might cry. “Twenty-four hours ago I would have sworn that if I had taught my children nothing else, it was good manners. I know that you children grew up in a different age than I did, but we had—”

  “Flagpole sitting and swing dancing,” Frank said loudly, looking at his wife. “I think we should cut out the melodrama,” he said, then turned to his son. “Look, the situation is that you’ve once again put your foot in it and now that beautiful girl is leaving. If she does, for one thing, it will make it very boring around here, but the major problem is that your mother is going to be in hot water with her sister. Thomas, you’re young and you don’t yet fully understand what you have to do in this world to keep peace in a family. If that girl storms out of here and your aunt Dot finds out about it, then one of those annoying family feuds is going to start, and those things can take years to die down. Every Thanksgiving and Christmas for years to come is going to be filled with ‘what-you-did.’ And I can tell you from experience that it makes for extremely unpleasant get-togethers.”

  Thomas’s frown deepened. “I told you that I’d apologize to her. I don’t know what else I can do. If I apologize and she still decides to leave, that isn’t my fault, is it?”

  Brooke, still seated, opened her mouth to speak, but her husband beat her to it. “Son, there’s logic and there’s women. They don’t have anything to do with each other.”

  “Really, Frank!” Brooke said. “What a dreadful thing to teach your son.”

  “Someone should teach him something!” Frank snapped back. “Come on, Thomas, you’re smart; what can you do to make her want to stay?”

  For a moment Thomas looked blank. His mother thought that it was nice to see him without his perpetual frown, but she did wish he hadn’t been so very stupid. Unfortunately, Frank was right and her younger sister was going to be livid when she heard that her protégée had walked out after spending less than a day with them.

  “Buy her a new fishing pole?” Th
omas said.

  For a moment neither Brooke nor her husband spoke; then they looked at each other and started laughing.

  It was Brooke who recovered first as her husband turned and looked out a window. He was shaking his head in disbelief and exasperation.

  “Thomas, darling,” Brooke said, and all her earlier annoyance was gone. “How shall I put this? You made the mess, so now you have to clean it up. When Madison does leave here, I want her to tell my sister that she had a wonderful time. Actually, I want her to say that she had the best time of her life.”

  Thomas did not like being laughed at. He wasn’t about to explain that he’d seen Madison fishing and that she would probably really like a full set of fishing gear. Instead, he thrust his hands into his pockets and the crease between his eyes deepened. “I see. You would like me to leave.”

  Frank turned back to face them. “Just the opposite. After what we saw yesterday, I’m sure that Madison was going to want to leave within a day or two anyway, even if you hadn’t shown up and insulted her. Her husband seems determined to ignore his beautiful wife, and you know your brother; he’ll want to stay up every night partying. If Madison goes out with them . . .” He looked at his wife.

  “I see,” Thomas said. “You want her to have a good time, but you don’t want her going out with that wild crowd my brother hangs around with when he’s up here. You don’t want someone as dishy as this Madison exposed to limitless alcohol and—” He gave his mother a hard look. “And whatever else that Scotty and his crowd do. I don’t know much about her, but I doubt if a girl raised in the backwoods of Montana is prepared for the crowd my little brother runs with.”

  Neither Frank nor his wife liked to admit out loud the truth about their younger son, but they couldn’t deny it. “Exactly,” Frank said at last.

  “So,” Thomas said stiffly, as he was still smarting over their laughter, “you want me to show her a good time and to keep her away from Scotty’s crowd. And, while I’m at it, I’m to keep her away from jealous little twits who will make her visit hell with their backbiting and snide remarks. And what else? Since she and her husband seem to despise each other, I assume I’m to keep her away from him too. Is that about it?”

  Brooke gave her son a weak smile. “I think you have it perfectly.”

  “What I wonder,” Thomas said, “is what the two of you would have done if I hadn’t insulted her?”

  “Begged,” Frank said cheerfully. “Thomas, you’re the only one who can do this. She’s young. She won’t want to spend time with us old folks. And Scotty’s friends will eat her alive. We were going to talk to you about this morning, but then you—”

  “Got to her first.” Thomas turned away from them both. He loved his aunt Dot. She was the one who’d encouraged him to go to medical school. His father said that Thomas’s brains came directly through his mother’s family. Brooke’s younger sister, Dot, had a medical degree and two PhDs. She was a dynamo in the world of physical therapy, having written the textbook that was used in medical schools all over the country.

  So what would Thomas say to this aunt who had done so much for him when Dot heard that this girl she’d taken under her wing had left after just a few hours as their guest? “I thought she was maybe working with that husband of hers in a blackmailing scheme, and I told her so two minutes after I met her.” No, he didn’t think that would get him off the hook.

  He turned back to his parents. “All right. I’ll fix it. Leave it to me,” he said, then he left the room. He’d had enough of feeling four years old.

  Eight

  “You’ve been what?” Madison said, staring at Thomas Randall. He had knocked on the bedroom door, and she’d said, “Come in,” expecting Frank to be there to help her with her suitcase. Instead, a solemn, scowling Thomas had opened the door, stepped inside the room, then closed the door behind him. Madison had walked around him and opened the door.

  Now, her hand still on the knob, she glared at him. “You’ve been what?” she said again, this time in a lower voice.

  “Ordered to be your slave for as long as you’re here,” he said without the slightest bit of humor in his voice.

  She didn’t know him, but there was something about the way his eyes darted off to one side that was suspicious. “So why don’t I believe you?” she asked.

  At that Thomas let out a sigh and walked further into the room. “Look, if I promise not to molest you, could we close the door? This could become embarrassing.”

  “For you or for me?”

  “Me,” he said.

  “Good,” she answered, then closed the door, but she didn’t move away from it. “Tell me what you have to say quickly. Your father is waiting for me.”

  “He is and he isn’t,” Thomas said.

  She had a feeling that this man she was seeing now wasn’t a man that many people saw. She had an idea that the real Thomas was sure of himself most, if not all, of the time, but now he was acting as though he’d rather face a firing squad than be here in this room alone with her. Just what my ego needed, she thought.

  “First of all, I owe you an apology,” he said. When she didn’t answer, but just stood there with her arms folded across her chest, he threw up his hands and sat down on the chair by the window. “Okay, so how’d you like the truth?”

  “It would make for a change around here.”

  At that Thomas gave the tiniest bit of a smile. “Do you know Dr. Dorothy Oliver?”

  “Yes,” Madison said tentatively. “But what does she have to do with my blackmailing your cousin in a divorce settlement?”

  “Mmph!” Thomas said as though she’d hit him. “She’s my aunt, my mother’s sister, and it seems that you and your husband were invited here so you could have a good time.”

  At that astonishing statement, the hostility left Madison, and she sat down on the corner of the bed. “Me?” Her mind was whirling. Since she’d arrived, she’d felt as though she were an intruder here, as though she didn’t belong, but all along, it had been her and not Roger who had actually been the guest.

  “Why don’t you start at the beginning?” Madison said, then watched him as he explained. When he’d finished, she said, “So you’re going to be in serious trouble if I leave?”

  “Well, it’s not as though the IRS is going to audit me or that I’m failing my courses or that—”

  “When will you see your aunt next?” Madison asked, smiling.

  Thomas grimaced. “Probably Thanksgiving.” He looked at her. “And if you leave now, I will be the turkey that’s served for dinner.”

  Madison laughed. “I see. So what has your family told you to do?”

  “When you do leave here, they want you to honestly be able to tell my aunt that you had the best time of your life.”

  For a moment Madison just stared at him, blinking; then she stood and paced back and forth a few times, thinking about this. Halting, she looked at him. “So exactly what does this mean?”

  “My mother wasn’t specific, but I think it means that I’m to give you anything you want.”

  “Carte blanche at Bergdorf’s?”

  “If that’s what you want,” he said stiffly.

  “Or does it mean that you are to ‘show me a good time’? Wine and dine me, that sort of thing?”

  “Whatever you want. We can fly into New York and go shopping. We could go out to some clubs there; then we could return here and I could take you out to some places where you could wear whatever you’ve bought in the city.”

  Turning away, she pretended to be considering what he’d just offered. She could tell that that’s exactly what he expected of her, or, rather, what he would expect of “someone like her,” as he’d probably put it. “All right,” she said as she turned back to him. “I’ll tell you what I want.”

  He lifted one eyebrow. “And what is that?”

  “Nothing,” she said. “I don’t want anything. I just want some time off from responsibility. I want to lie about in a hammock a
ll day long. I want to read trashy novels. I want to work jigsaw puzzles. I want to eat too much, then do nothing but lie around in the sun. The most strenuous thing I want to do is lift a glass of lemonade.”

  From the look on his face she knew that she’d startled him. Obviously, it wasn’t what he’d expected her to say. In a way, it was rather like having a genie offer you three wishes, then turning them down.

  “Are you sure?” he asked softly. “My brother will be going to parties and I’m sure that Roger will go with him. You’ll need something to wear, so I can—”

  “No, I won’t need anything to wear to parties because I won’t be attending any parties. Look, I know that everyone in this house sees that there isn’t much left between Roger and me. I don’t think anyone can go through what we have and still be ‘in love,’ so you might as well know that Roger and I have agreed to take a vacation from each other. He may go to all the parties he wants, but I was never one for large gatherings and I have no interest in them.”

  She could tell that he wasn’t believing her. In exasperation she said, “From the moment you saw me, you’ve thought nothing but bad about me. What in the world could I have done to give you such an opinion of me?”

  His voice was very quiet when he spoke. “Usually girls who look like you think only of diamonds and places to wear them.”

  That made Madison laugh. “Maybe that’s true in the world you live in, but not in my world. Believe it or not, Mr. Randall, there’s a person inside here.”

  He was staring at her in a way that made Madison think that she’d forgotten to put on her clothes.

  “You know, I think maybe there is,” he said, then, slowly, he stood up and walked to the door. “I will see that you have everything you want,” he said, then left the room.

  After he left, Madison seemed to deflate. There was something about him that, when she was near him, made her feel charged with electricity. If she got angry, she seemed to get extremely angry. And if he made her laugh, she seemed to laugh all the way to her toes. And when he gave her a compliment, Madison was sure that it was the best compliment that she’d ever had in her life.