The Midas Legacy (Wilde/Chase 12)

by Andy McDermott

  ‘It seems like you’ll be around for a while yet,’ Nina joked.

  ‘That’s not what I meant.’

  ‘No?’

  She turned to face Nina directly. ‘After everything I’ve done, all the death and destruction that came from my keeping the truth from you – including Macy’s life being put in danger – I can’t imagine that you would ever want to see me again. And I fully accept that, and that I brought it entirely on myself. Now, I know you want nothing to do with the Legacy or its money. But it exists, so I’ve arranged for everything I have to be put into trust for Macy after I’m gone. And don’t object,’ she said, raising a hand on seeing Nina about to do so. ‘If she wants to donate every penny to charity, that’s up to her. But let her make the decision herself. I’m sure you’ll bring her up to make the best one.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Nina in response to the compliment, though she was still far from happy about what she considered the Legacy’s dirty money. That disagreement could wait for another day, however, as there was something else she wanted – needed – to say. ‘But you’re wrong that I don’t want to see you again.’

  Olivia was genuinely surprised. ‘Really?’

  ‘Really. I would like you to be a part of my life. And Macy’s. She may never have gotten to meet her grandmother, but her great-grandmother’s still there for her.’

  ‘I’m . . .’ She blinked at Nina, wiping away a small tear. ‘I don’t know what to say. I’m truly touched. And grateful.’

  Nina smiled. ‘My pleasure.’

  ‘And mine.’ Olivia returned it. ‘Laura and Henry raised a most remarkable woman together. And I’m glad that, however long it took, I got to meet her.’

  ‘You say that like it’s a one-time deal. So cut it out.’ They both laughed. ‘Come with me.’ Nina stood.

  ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘Eddie’s with Macy at the Turtle Pond.’ She gestured in the direction of the small lake near the Shakespeare Garden. ‘We thought you might like to join us for lunch.’

  ‘I . . . Of course.’ Olivia took her proffered hand and stood, a little unsteady on her frostbitten feet. ‘I’d be honoured.’

  ‘Good. Because I don’t want to make the same mistake that you and Mom did.’ She linked an arm with her grandmother’s, and they set off down the sunlit path together. ‘Whatever else may have happened, you’re still part of my family. And my family always sticks together.’

  Twenty-four Years Earlier

  ‘What’re you doing, honey?’ asked Laura Wilde, entering her bedroom to find her daughter stretched across the bed.

  Nina took off her Walkman headphones, the tinny sounds of Ace of Base escaping, and rolled over. ‘I was looking at these old photos.’ A large shoebox full of pictures was beside her.

  Laura glanced at the wardrobe where the box normally resided. ‘Were you trying on my shoes again?’ she said with a smile. ‘I’ve told you before, you’re too young for high heels.’

  ‘Ugh, Mom, I’m fourteen,’ Nina said, rolling her eyes. ‘But high heels aren’t my thing. They wouldn’t be much use on a dig! No, I was looking for the pictures from Morocco – you know, where you found my pendant.’ She fingered the scrap of oddly tinted metal that Laura and her husband had found on an unsuccessful attempt to uncover clues to the location of Atlantis six years earlier.

  ‘Yeah, I remember.’ She sat on the bed, regarding the pictures spread across it. ‘Those aren’t from Morocco, though.’

  ‘No, I kinda got sidetracked . . .’ Nina giggled. ‘These are from before I was born, aren’t they?’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Laura. The print the teen had been examining was of herself and Henry, laughing at the camera – had Jack Philby taken it? – somewhere on the campus at Columbia. ‘We were at university in that one; I think we’d just finished our final exams. So apologies for the terrible outfits and haircuts, but it was the seventies.’

  ‘I think they’re cute,’ said Nina, grinning. ‘Very retro.’ She looked back at the image of her parents. ‘You look so happy.’

  ‘We were.’ Laura’s smile this time was at the memories flooding back. ‘You know, from the very first time I spoke to your dad, I knew he was going to be a big part of my life. I couldn’t have imagined how much, though.’

  ‘It’s so cool that you still love him so much. Loads of the parents of the kids in my class are divorced, or hate each other.’

  ‘Your dad and I’ll be together until we die,’ Laura assured her.

  ‘That’s so romantic. I wonder if I’ll ever meet anyone who makes me feel like that?’

  ‘I’m sure you will, honey.’ She leaned over to see some of the other photos. ‘What else have we got here?’

  Her daughter held one up. ‘This is you and your mom, isn’t it?’

  Laura felt a pang of guilt that she had over time become practised enough not to show, though it had been a while since she’d covered her feelings in such a way. ‘Yeah, it is,’ she said, taking the picture from her and gazing at the frozen moment from her past. ‘We were at the Shakespeare Garden in Central Park. That’s . . . the last photo I have of her.’

  ‘Before she and Grandad died?’

  ‘Mm.’ Nina took her non-committal response as an affirmative, but even so Laura was painfully aware that she had just told an untruth by omission. Her mother was still alive and, as far as she knew, well, but they hadn’t spoken to each other since just before her wedding. The anger-driven lie she told Henry early in their relationship about Olivia having died in the same car accident as her father had taken on a life of its own out of her fear of revealing the truth; of exposing her betrayal of first her husband’s, and now her daughter’s, trust . . .

  She was so wrapped up in her own regretful thoughts that the next question caught her off guard. ‘Do you miss her?’

  ‘I . . . I do, yes,’ she admitted. ‘I wish there was some way I could see her again without . . . needing a time machine,’ she said, catching a questioning look starting to form on Nina’s face. ‘But I guess that’s not going to happen.’

  ‘If you had a time machine, archaeology wouldn’t be much fun.’

  ‘If we had a time machine and could go back into the past to see what it was like, we’d be sociologists, not archaeologists,’ said Henry Wilde with a chuckle as he entered. ‘And I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.’ He spotted the photo of himself and Laura. ‘Oh hey, I remember that!’

  Laura got up and kissed him. ‘That was a good time, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Yeah. And the best thing is, it never stopped.’ He returned the kiss.

  Nina tutted. ‘Get a room.’

  ‘This is our room! So, are we going for lunch? There’s a new deli a couple of blocks away that I had recommended to me, Aldo’s, something like that. I fancy some ridiculous combination of ingredients, give them a proper test.’

  Nina slid off the bed. ‘Sounds good!’

  ‘Put those away first,’ her mother told her, indicating the pictures. The teenager made another impatient sound, but turned to gather them up.

  The last one was still in Laura’s hand. She contemplated it again. ‘You okay?’ asked Henry. ‘You look sad.’

  ‘Huh? No, I was just . . . you know. Words left unsaid.’ Another moment of reverie, then she put the picture in the box and Nina closed the lid on it. Laura smiled at her daughter and husband. ‘But things are what they are. And I don’t regret any of the choices I’ve made, because they brought me here.’ Her face brightened. ‘Come on. Life is good; let’s go enjoy it together.’