It was a constant complaint of his and Elizabeth’s that the beach house did not have an open concept floor plan. How else could he monitor the comings and goings from his own home without a clear line of vision from his favorite chair into the front foyer?
They also complained about not having enough money to make the ‘necessary’ home improvements.
“I’m going to visit a friend,” Anne answered him.
“You’ve been here a little over a week and most of that time was spent on the computer filling out pointless applications.”
“My time spent preparing for my future was not pointless,” Anne countered. “And I have a friend from high school that moved down here with her boyfriend at the time for school. I would have visited her yesterday, except she had a doctor’s appointment.”
“With Will?” Elizabeth asked, popping her head up from the yoga pose she was in the middle of performing.
“I don’t know who her doctor is,” Anne admitted.
“That’s a shame,” Elizabeth sighed, moving back into her pose.
She didn’t bother asking which friend. Elizabeth never really cared about Anne beyond what Anne could do for Elizabeth.
“Who is this friend?” Walter demanded to know.
“Robin Moore Smith,” she answered him. “She was my best friend in school. She spent the night a few times.”
Shrugging a shoulder, he dismissed her. “Just be back in time for Will’s visit,” he instructed her. “Will can do better for you and your future than some Mrs. Smith can do.”
“Robin’s husband was studying to become a doctor.” Looking up from grabbing her umbrella, she added, “And I don’t know when I’ll be back.”
“Oh,” Elizabeth’s head popped up. “A future doctor.”
“Was,” Anne corrected. “He died in a car accident two years ago.”
Waving a hand in dismissal, Elizabeth rolled her eyes and went back to yoga.
“So…” Walter trailed off, his eyes narrowed. “You would rather spend time with an unknown widow that can do nothing to help elevate your social or financial standing?”
“Father,” Anne tried to warn him before he said anything else.
“Tell me,” he demanded, “what can this widow provide you that Will can’t? Widows only want one thing and that is to find a way into my pockets.”
Standing up from where she was practicing her own yoga poses next to Elizabeth, Penelope left the room, barely brushing away the tears that threatened to fall from her eyes.
“Father,” Anne hissed. “Not every single widow has an ulterior motive. Sometimes they are just friends, much like Penelope is to Elizabeth.”
Waving a hand in dismissal, Walter ignored the underlying message beneath Anne’s comment. “Widows are widows are widows. If it looks like a gold digger, it is a gold digger.”
Elizabeth stood up, glared at Anne instead of the person making comments, and stormed out of the room, leaving the yoga mats in the middle of the floor.
Checking the address on her phone, Anne knocked on the, thankfully, first-floor apartment door. She had no idea what to expect. She hadn’t seen Robin ever since high school and they went off in their own directions.
Social media didn’t count, even if they talked more than Anne did with the people on her Facebook Friends List that were attending the same college as she had been. She could count on her hands, and feet, how many times she had seen a former high school classmate in public that pretended that he or she didn’t recognize Anne.
Granted, there were a few people that Anne did the same with and was more than careful avoid them.
“Coming!” sounded from the other side of the door. “I’ll be there in a moment, Anne!”
Anne had no idea what she was about to see. Robin was careful to keep pictures of herself off of social media. At least, she kept pictures of more than just her headshot off of all of her social media accounts.
But Anne recalled that Robin had been in a car accident that had killed Nathan, even if she wasn’t aware of the details. Nobody except Robin, Nathan, and whoever hit them was aware of the details. Mrs. Moore certainly never talked about what had happened to her daughter.
Anne wasn’t even certain if Robin’s parents ever talked to Robin anymore, let alone come to visit her.
Suddenly the door opened, even if Robin wasn’t visible. “Come on in,” she said, her voice muffled from behind the door. “I don’t want you to be shocked when you finally see me, but…”
“Robin,” Anne interrupted, taking the door from Robin’s hand. “I already know you were in a car accident.”
Pulling the door away and shutting it, revealed her friend in a wheelchair. “I was lucky to get a first-floor apartment. Apparently, the elevator keeps breaking down in this building because everybody keeps overloading the circuits or some technical excuse the landlords give in order to keep people from complaining too much.”
Anne quickly cut off her friend’s rambling by dropping her purse on the floor and leaning down to give Robin a tight hug. “I’ve missed you so much,” she whispered into the other girl’s hair. “I have so much to tell you.”
Feeling arms wrapping around her as well, “You have no idea how much I missed you as well. I think I would have gone crazy without your messages.”
Pulling away, Anne took a moment to look around the room. Robin recognized this from years ago. She expected that Anne would start to examine her space around her after they had gotten the surprisingly not awkward first meeting out of the way.
Surrounding every space that Robin could reach was fashion designs and torn out pages from magazines.
“Oh my goodness,” Anne breathed, turning around the room. “I knew you should have gone to fashion school instead of becoming a nurse.”
“Oh, but I did discover some valuable contacts while in nursing school. One of my friends, Meredith Rook, comes over and helps me with some of the things that I can’t do. She also sticks around and gives me a fair amount of the local gossip.”
“I would love to meet your Nurse Rook. She sounds as if she could be a huge help for me. I’d love to know how my family is viewed in this place.”
“Are you certain you want to know?”
“Do you know?”
“Of course, I know!” Robin exclaimed. “Go sit down and we’ll have a lovely chat.”
“Who are you and what have you done with my Robin?”
“We all grew up,” Robin demurely answered her. “I spend a lot of time reading lately.”
“You can always leave your apartment.”
“Honestly, the first time I attempted to leave I had a panic attack. Meredith had to calm me down and bring me back into my apartment.”
“What happened?”
Robin pointed towards the scar that dissected her left cheek, “A shard of glass from the window made a deeper cut than anybody realized.”
“That’s not what I meant and you know it.”
“A kid saw me and started to point. That kid’s older brother started to laugh. Their mother stared at me in horror as she hurried her rude boys away. Then suddenly I could see it happening over and over again. I had flashes of that scene in The Princess Bride when Westley taunts Prince Humperdinck about scarring him to the point of children screaming in fear and asking what that ‘thing’ was.”
“Oh, Robin,” Anne whispered, a tear falling down her face. “That’s simply horrible.”
“I know.”
“But you can’t let three rude people dictate what you do with your life,” Anne stated.
“I feel as if I have heard something along those lines before.”
“You probably told me that.”
“I probably did.” Tilting her head, Robin eyed Anne carefully. “You look different.”
“My hair is still in its ponytail.”
“But, if your newsfeed is any indication, it hasn’t always been.”
“No, it hasn’t,” Anne replied, looking down.
“Can you tell me what happened?”
“How long do you have?”
Spreading her arms wide, Robin joked, “All the time in the world.”
For the next two hours, Anne told Robin everything that had happened over the last year.
Chapter Fifty-Six
“Let’s go shopping,” Elizabeth turned to Penelope and suggested.
“Can I go?” Anne asked carefully. “I left my art supplies at Mary’s.”
“I didn’t invite you, Anne,” Elizabeth sniffed.
Penelope opted to stay home, a sneezing fit keeping her from daring venture out into the overcast skies that had previously promised rain. At first, Elizabeth had dismissed Penelope’s prediction of rain, despite the weather forecast, in an attempt to coax her best friend out of the house, until Will arrived and offered to take Anne to an art store.
“It’s supposed to rain,” he pointed out in an attempt to keep Anne to himself, “and I remember you saying that you needed some art supplies.”
“Yes,” Anne replied, drawing out her response as she wondered how he had recalled her mentioning two days ago that she wished she had included a sketchbook when she had packed to come down here. “I did.”
“Well,” Will grinned, “I found the perfect place.”
She didn’t want to tell him that she had also found the perfect art supply store. The only problem was that the store was in North Carolina and she doubted he would be willing to drive her that far.
Anne’s brow furrowed as she realized she didn’t want to share that store with anybody besides Derek.
“What was that?”
“What was what?”
“The thought you had that caused you to crease that perfect forehead.”
Resisting the urge to roll her eyes at his over-the-top compliment, Anne battled internally between joining him and getting to go to an art supply store or dismissing his offer and having to find it herself later.
“It was nothing,” she finally dismissed. “Let me go get my purse.”
Elizabeth perked up. “Shopping! Oh, I’d love to get out of the house!”
Will stiffened up, his face making a pained expression that only Anne could see. He never considered how that expression would cause Anne to reevaluate her already unfavorable opinion of him. It didn’t matter how trying Elizabeth could be, she was still Anne’s sister, his cousin, family.
Turning around, his mask back in place, Will smiled his most charming smile. “It’s only to the art store.”
“But there is a plethora of stores around that one store. There’s a used book store, and a confectionary that has the most delightful fudge, and this classy clothing consignment store. They had a purse in their window last week that I’m hoping is still there.”
Brows creasing again, Anne asked, “You knew about the art store last week when I asked if you knew of any nearby?”
“Yeah, so,” Elizabeth shrugged.
“You told me you didn’t.”
“I forgot.”
Lips pinching together, Anne held her tongue, closed her eyes, and counted to ten backward. She started to regret not looking up art supply stores online after she had asked Elizabeth if she knew of any.
“I call shotgun!” Elizabeth called out as she headed towards the door.
“Are you just going to leave me here?” Penelope called out from the sofa where she was reading with lackluster enthusiasm. Suddenly, a sneezing fit set her off. “Fine,” she waved off between sneezes. “Go without me.” Before Anne had made it through the doorway she added, “Please bring back soup!”
Turning around, Anne weakly smiled, “I can’t even guarantee that I’ll make it to the art supply store.” Before closing the door, she added, “But there already is some soup in the fridge. You can heat it up in the microwave.”
At first, she had considered making Penelope look for it, but she felt bad for the other girl. Nobody should suffer a cold alone.
“Thank you!” Penelope called back before sneezing.
“If you are going to sneeze all over everything,” Anne heard her father say, “then go do it in another room.”
Derek sneezing as he entered the shop door was the first thing that had caught Anne’s attention. It had also caught the attention of the owner of the shop that spent her time glaring at Derek even though he had sneezed into his shirt sleeve at his elbow.
“Sorry!” he called out, sending her a charming smile before scanning the area. He had seen Anne darting into the shop the moment the skies opened up and rain started pouring down.
He had also seen Elizabeth – he recognized her from the various photos of the Elliot sisters that had been around Mary’s house – and somebody else who could only be William Elliot. They had been heading towards the parking lot while Anne and William Elliot were debating something before it had started to rain. Elizabeth had stopped and was looking in a window before disappearing into the store.
After the rain had begun, Will darted towards the parking lot and Anne had dashed into the store Derek had now followed her into.
“Derek?” she asked from where she was looking at the fudge on display. “What are you doing here?”
“I went to your house, but your father said you were out shopping with your sister and William Elliot,” he admitted.
“Well,” she hesitated, “why were you at my house? Is Isa okay?”
“Isa and her new boyfriend, James, are perfectly fine,” he grinned down at her.
Suddenly another sneeze overtook him and he turned around to sneeze into his sleeve again.
“You never did have a good immune system,” she sniffed.
“My immune system is perfectly fine.”
“Only you would get a summer cold.”
“I got stuck in the rain yesterday when Sophy wanted to walk down the beach right after we finally got settled in. It took two days to get a rental car.”
“It’s been an abnormally rainy summer this year,” Anne stated. “Why did you come down here?”
“I thought that it was obvious. I came here for…”
But before he could finish his sentence, Will entered the shop and interrupted their conversation.
“Oh,” Anne snapped into position, shaking her head slightly. “Derek, this is my cousin, Will Elliot. Will, this is Derek Worth.”
“Nice to meet you,” Derek politely replied, holding out one of his hands. Mentally he hoped that Will would catch his cold and be out of commission.
“Adopted cousin,” Will corrected, ignoring the proffered hand in front of him. “We aren’t related by blood.”
“You are still my cousin,” Anne replied with an eye roll. “What were you saying, Derek?” she asked, turning her body to face Derek and intentionally shutting Will out of their conversation.
However, Will wasn’t having it. “I’m parked at the curb, Anne,” he interrupted.
Turning back towards where Derek was watching them, Anne struggled to say something. She suspected that Will hadn’t exactly parked legally. “Derek, I…”
“I’ll see you later,” he promised her as Will practically pulled her out of the store.
Turning towards the owner – who had been watching the exchange – he pointed towards the fudge sampler that Anne had been eying when he entered the store and the lemon Bundt cake that had caught his eye.
“I’m amazed that you didn’t sneeze on anything,” the owner replied as she packaged up his selections.
“I’ve worked in food service before,” he answered, remembering the job he had taken two years before he realized that tutoring paid better for the amount of time spent. “I learned a few tricks.”
“Impressive,” was all the owner said as she rang up the order.
Looking out the window, Derek wondered if they were heading back towards their house, or if Elizabeth was sending them off to parts unknown to him.
Across the street, he saw an art supply store and it beckoned to him. Looking up at the w
ater falling from the sky, he shook his head, waved goodbye to the sales clerk, and darted out into the rain and across the street.
Nearly skidding to a halt at the overhang, he shook himself off before entering the store. “Lovely weather this time of year, isn’t it?” he joked.
Shaking his head, the cashier rolled his eyes. “How can I help you?”
“Sketchbooks and drawing pencils,” Derek replied.
“Aisles five and seven,” the cashier directed before returning to the book in front of him. “Let me know if you need anything else.”
“Okay.”
Heading over to the sketchbooks, he wondered if he should pick her up another new book when there was a blank book stashed in his suitcase. He had stashed it and the other art supplies in the rental car when he went to her house.
Glancing over at the cashier, he felt bad about entering the store and not buying anything. It wasn’t as if this was a big box store that could afford somebody walking out without paying for something.
“Is something wrong?”
“There are so many choices. I don’t know what my girlfriend would like,” Derek lied.
“You might need to bring her back before you buy anything,” the guy suggested. “I know my girlfriend doesn’t always appreciate the gesture if I buy the wrong thing for her.”
“You might need a new girlfriend,” Derek retorted, “if she doesn’t appreciate the small gestures.”
“Says the person staring at sketchbooks,” the cashier countered.
“Good point,” he replied. “Is your girlfriend an artist?”
“No.”
“You?”
“Of course,” he answered, nearly rolling his eyes.
“Then you understand the sketchbook dilemma versus simply being ungrateful.”
“Good point.”
“We’ll be back,” Derek promised before walking back in the rain. He suspected this had been Anne’s initial destination before Elizabeth had taken over the shopping trip.
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Punching the doorbell, Derek waited on somebody to answer the door. He suspected it would be Anne sent to open the door since they normally sent her to do things like this.
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