The Country Guesthouse

by Robyn Carr

  That’s where we differ, Hannah thought. I finally realized you would.

  * * *

  Helen didn’t know that Hannah and Victoria would be meeting for coffee at the café in Leadville, but she recognized their cars parked outside. She’d been haunting Leadville for the past week, looking for an opportunity to run into Victoria. A chance meeting.

  Oh, Sully might be right—she might be making trouble! But she was going with her gut instinct. Her gut was going with the obvious. Any self-respecting grandmother who longed for her beloved grandchild began that longing when he was a baby. A new baby.

  She browsed in the bookstore, near the front window, watching the coffee shop. Hannah left first and didn’t notice Helen or her car. Victoria left second. She drove a few blocks to the market. This was perfect. Helen could kill two birds with one stone. She needed a couple of things for dinner.

  Inside the market, Helen grabbed a small cart and crept down the aisles like the super sleuths she was always writing about. When she saw Victoria poking around the produce, she made a sharp turn, drove her cart around an island piled high with fruit and melons and smashed right into Victoria’s cart. “Hey!” Helen fairly yelled. “Oh! Mrs. Addison! Excuse me!”

  Victoria glowered at her.

  “What an oaf I am! I’m so sorry! You’re all right, aren’t you?”

  “I’m fine,” she said. “Do I know you?”

  “I’m sorry, it’s Helen Culver. I’m a friend of Owen Abrams and I was in court the day you argued for time with your grandson. Oh, I wanted to reach out to you just then, but you seemed so upset. I’m so sorry that didn’t work out better. I’m a grandmother myself. Well, not technically—it’s my niece, who I raised, who just had a baby. And I know only too well how difficult it can be, wanting more time with your grandchild.”

  “Do you now?” Victoria asked, clearly cynical.

  “Well, let me rephrase. My niece would have me take care of the baby full-time if she could, but that wasn’t exactly on my agenda. But if anything happened to my niece, I can assure you, I wouldn’t want my great-niece given to another family. Are you doing all right, Mrs. Addison?”

  “I’ve been better,” she said. “What did you say your name was?”

  “Helen,” she said. “I know Owen because he’s a neighbor. I live on that same lake.” She looked at her watch. “You know what we should do? Maybe get a coffee. Or better still—a glass of wine! I hardly ever meet women in my same generation.”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I just—”

  “I have to grab some broccoli and onions for dinner, then I’m free for a couple of hours. I’m taking the afternoon off from work and I admit—I wouldn’t mind a little gossip time with a woman. What do you say? Coffee or wine?”

  “I suppose. But I don’t have much time.”

  “Let’s finish up here and meet at that little pub across the street. How’s that?”

  “All right.”

  Helen quickly tossed some broccoli and onions into her cart. She was momentarily at a disadvantage—she had expected Victoria to know who she was. Helen was not universally well-known, but in some circles she was a bit impossibly well-known. At book fairs, conferences and conventions, people sometimes stared and were afraid to approach her. When someone knew she was a moderately famous author, they were anxious to talk about themselves.

  Oh, well, she’d have to prime Victoria a bit. All she really hoped to get out of this meeting was a clue as to who this woman really was and what motivated her. It was impossible for her to believe that all Victoria’s maternal feelings suddenly bubbled to the surface a few months ago. Even more important, Helen wanted to know what kind of mother Victoria had been. Things must have been quite awful for Erin to go to such lengths to be sure her child wasn’t raised by his grandmother.

  Victoria was already settled into a booth in the pub when Helen walked in. Helen slid in opposite her.

  “Just what I need,” she said.

  “Me, too,” Victoria said. “I’m sorry if it sounded like I wasn’t very grateful for the invitation. I’m in a mood. I’ve just come from coffee with Hannah. A meeting, if you please. Where she dressed me down and told me what my boundaries had better be if I hope to ever see Noah again.”

  “Hannah? She doesn’t seem like the sort,” Helen said. “What’s that all about?”

  “I’m not sure,” Victoria said.

  The waitress was at their table and they each ordered a glass of wine.

  “You were saying,” Helen urged.

  “That’s all there is to tell,” Victoria said. “I’ve been asking permission to see him for an hour here or there and so far, the answer is no. Today she told me it’s going to be no for some time and suggested I just go back to Minneapolis and wait to be summoned.” She laughed hollowly. “I was laid off last year and haven’t worked in a good while. I don’t have money to fly back and forth. I wonder if it’s worth it to stay on here if Hannah is just going to prevent me from seeing my grandson.”

  “Oh, Victoria, I had no idea...”

  “Well, it’s something I’m going to have to think through, make a decision. I suppose I should accept the inevitable. I thought she would be more understanding...”

  “If you don’t mind me asking, what in the world happened between you and your daughter?”

  “Well, it’s not easy for me... Erin was a vicious daughter. I couldn’t please her no matter how I tried. She had a falling-out with her brother, moved away and stopped talking to both of us. Roger is no angel—I’ll be the first to admit that—but he tried. Tried and failed. But for Erin to stop talking to me, for her to make me out to be some kind of monster...”

  The wine arrived and Victoria took a sip.

  “I was so shocked and ashamed by the things she said about me in some letter her lawyer produced. She called me abusive, claimed that I never protected her, that I allowed her brother to physically abuse her, that I was cruel. I don’t know where that came from. I didn’t have an easy life and I did my best to be a good mother.”

  “Of course you did,” Helen said.

  “And I’d do my best to be a good grandmother. But Hannah has hooked herself up to a rich man and she won’t budge. She isn’t going to give me a chance and her rich boyfriend is going to back her up no matter the legal cost.”

  “Owen?” Helen asked. “Oh, Victoria, I’m sure Owen isn’t rich.”

  “I saw that house,” Victoria said.

  “Yes, it’s something, isn’t it? He rents it out when he travels on photo shoots. You have to understand about writers—hardly any of them make money. Most barely squeak by. Owen has made a comment or two about spending too much on that house and wondering if he should sell it.”

  “Is that a fact? What do you know about writers? And I thought he was a photographer, not a writer.”

  “He publishes photo essays. Coffee-table books. They’re beautiful and he’s well-known for them but they’re not runaway bestsellers. They sell a respectable number to libraries. The real money is in popular fiction.”

  “Huh,” she said. “How does he get this fancy Wikipedia page and everything? If you google him, he’s all over the place!”

  “That doesn’t cost anything,” Helen said. “You can put yourself out there in a big way, too. Just by spending some time on the computer and generating some photos and content. I do it all the time.”

  “For what?”

  “I’m a writer, too. A little luckier than Owen—I’ve been at it a long time and lucky for me, my books are popular. But don’t get me wrong, I love Owen’s work. He’s very gifted. I just don’t think he’s rich, that’s all. Maybe he will be one day.

  “Now, tell me, Victoria. What kind of work were you doing when you were laid off?”

  “Oh, that. I’ve done every kind of work imaginable. I’ve worked in r
eal estate, in mortgages, home health care—”

  “You’re a nurse!” Helen said.

  “No, not that kind of care,” she said with a laugh. “I don’t like to mop up. I’m more of a counselor, the kind of overall care needed by the elderly or disabled—everything from arranging long-term health care to reverse mortgages, that sort of thing. I’m best at helping people. I’m good at taking care of the details so these poor folks with no one to help them aren’t completely abandoned. It’s all very ordinary and doesn’t exactly pay well, but it’s satisfying. But tell me about your writing? I can’t believe I know a real writer!”

  Helen wasn’t above laying it on a little thick, glamorizing her profession more than was accurate. The truth was she pulled on jeans and a top, sat on the porch and typed every day, had a light lunch with Sully, had a little exercise, messed around in the garden, had dinner, read in the evening and then repeated. She’d never spent so much time out of her routine as in the past week, stalking Victoria. It was frankly driving her bonkers. Sully was right—Helen didn’t like to poke around.

  She did like research, however.

  So she told Victoria about her travels and vacations, the few famous people she’d met and plans she had for renting a condo in San Diego for a few months come winter. And she thought it might be about time for a new car.

  Victoria chattered on about how much she liked Colorado but wasn’t sure she could afford to stay and then she asked Helen a lot of questions. Helen was looking for important talking points. Victoria wanted to know more about Helen’s travels, like where and when and what hotels she stayed in. She asked about Helen’s books, of course, and asked where she got her ideas. They talked about the Crossing and Sully and his garden. Victoria wanted to know where in Chicago she had lived and whether she had any good friends besides Owen. “I’m very close to my niece,” Helen said. “But she’s married with a baby and quite busy with her husband. I’m something of a loner while I’m here. It’s when I travel that I see my women friends, and I have some wonderful ones in the writing community. It’s nice to have met you! Finally, someone closer to my age I can talk to.”

  Victoria asked if Helen had a secretary and who managed all her business details. She said she hoped Helen had experts to help her protect her assets. “That’s what I did for a living, you know. I connected people with the right agents and managers to make sure they got the most out of their retirement or disability funds.”

  Every now and then she’d turn the conversation back to herself and drop in something a little emotional—with Erin gone and Roger pretty much out of the picture these days, she felt she had no family at all. She longed for her daughter’s company, but it had been so long since they were on good terms. She’d had a hard life, twice widowed—though Helen knew that would actually be divorced—and struggling to raise two children alone.

  Sully called her cell phone and Helen sent him to voice mail. “I’ll have to go soon. Sully’s probably restless and hungry. But we’ll have to do this again. Let me give you my number.”

  “You don’t feel awkward, do you?” Victoria asked. “Hannah and Owen are trying to keep me as far away as possible.”

  “If we’re friendly, it has nothing to do with them, does it?” Helen said. “An occasional coffee klatch or glass of wine, that’s just what the doctor ordered.”

  “Don’t even bring up doctors,” Victoria said. “That’s a particular problem right now.”

  “Oh?” Helen asked.

  “I need to see my oncologist,” she said. “It’s a long story. We’ll talk about it next time.”

  “But you know my niece is a doctor, don’t you? Family medicine and emergency medicine. She runs the urgent care in town...”

  “Unfortunately, that’s not the kind of doctor I need. Let’s put that subject on hold for now.”

  “Of course,” Helen said. “But where is your doctor?”

  “There’s more than one. Primarily, the Mayo Clinic. Now, when can we get together again?”

  “I absolutely must work the next couple of days. How does Tuesday look for you?” Helen asked.

  “What on earth do I have to take up my time? Tuesday would be perfect. Same time, same place?”

  “Three thirty right here,” Helen said. “See you then.”

  They hugged in parting, girlfriends. Helen went to her car. Now Victoria had a couple of days to research Helen. She called Sully from the car.

  “I’m on my way. Did you think of anything else you need?”

  “Not a thing, my dear. Have you caused any trouble?”

  “Not yet, I haven’t,” she said.

  * * *

  Helen did a lot of writing about heroes and heroines, but she also had to write about the bad guys and gals. Over the years she’d learned a lot about how they played out. She’d studied interrogation techniques and body language. Victoria hadn’t said or done anything obviously suspicious and her body language was appropriate to their discussion, except those few times her eyes strayed, as though looking up or askance in search of the next comment or answer to a question. And it was the weirdest thing—her damn ears got a little red when she lied. Helen was going to have to look that up. When she said her daughter was vicious, pink ears. When she said she would be a wonderful grandmother, she pursed her lips. When she was asking Helen questions that directly related to how much money she could spend, she got a hungry look and crossed one arm over her chest protectively.

  Helen didn’t know much, but she knew Victoria was lying and she was after something. She wondered about her work as a counselor for seniors, but Hannah said Cal had learned that. And this business about an oncologist? When a woman of a certain age had a condition that required a cancer doctor, it was usually impossible to shut them up, yet Victoria wanted to save that conversation for later.

  When she got home, Sully was marinating some chicken breasts in the kitchen at the store.

  “Oh, you sweet man, you couldn’t wait for me. I brought us some broccoli.”

  “Why do you have such a satisfied look on your face?” he asked.

  “I finally ran into Victoria Addison. Literally. I took her to a pub for a glass of wine and the story of her life. It’s a bit different from the story Hannah told us.”

  “If you think she’s not a good person, should you be spending time with her?”

  “Someone she doesn’t suspect has to, Sully. Besides, there’s an old saying—keep your friends close and your enemies closer.”

  “And what is it you hope to gain?”

  “Her motivation,” Helen said. “It’s exactly the way you’d construct a novel. The villain can’t just be bad for no reason, they have to be driven to be bad for a very specific reason. Hannah and Owen can’t very well protect Noah from harm if they don’t know what they’re dealing with.”

  “Is it not possible she just wants to spend time with her only grandchild?”

  “Anything is possible, darling. We’re going to find out.”

  “Helen, do you do this sort of thing regularly?” he asked.

  “Oh, a time or two I’ve dug around in places I should stay out of, but nothing terrible ever happened. Oh, there was that one time... I called the police department and after explaining who I was and what I did for a living, I asked them how a person would dispose of a lot of heroin. This was before Google, you know. They referred me to the information officer who never returned my call. But I did have an unmarked car in front of my house for a long time. And an excessive number of patrol drive-bys. Why they didn’t just ring the bell and ask me why I wanted to know is beyond me. But see, nothing bad—”

  “Jesus,” Sully said. “You’re lucky the SWAT team didn’t kick in your door and cuff you!”

  “I don’t think there’s any danger of that here. Do you?”

  “No, but you could piss someone off!”

 
“Somehow, I don’t think so. I think she’s dirty. All I’m lacking are the facts.”

  However mean your life is,

  meet it and live it.

  —Henry David Thoreau

  15

  Hannah watched as September gently settled over the land just as she settled into her new life. The leaves were just starting to turn and Sully’s campground had fewer campers.

  Noah had come a long way since that first day of school when he thought he was too sick to go. Now he was happy each morning and even wanted to see some of his friends outside school. That presented a new challenge to Hannah—she wasn’t sure how to verify that the homes he’d be visiting were safe for him without looking like she was paranoid and overprotective. She decided to admit her doubts and wear them like armor. His first playdate was just after the first week of school at his friend Seth Loughlin’s house. She decided to be up front about everything when she dropped him off.

  “Mrs. Loughlin, I don’t know if you know this, but I’m a new mother. In fact, I’m not an official mother, but have been Noah’s guardian for the past few months and we’re a forever team.”

  “I didn’t know,” Sue Loughlin said. “Please, call me Sue. I guess that explains why he calls you Hannah. My daughter went through a phase of calling me by my first name, so you can never tell about things like that.”

  “I’m pretty inexperienced at this but I feel like I should ask a few questions before dropping Noah at your house to play.”

  Sue laughed lightly and said, “The house is safe and childproofed. My husband’s hunting rifles are locked in a gun safe in the garage and there are no guns in the house. If Noah has any food allergies, just tell me and I’ll be sure he doesn’t get any of those foods at our house. And I will absolutely be supervising. They can play in the rec room or the fenced backyard. There is no pool, and they aren’t allowed in the front by the street unless I’m out there with them.”

  Hannah smiled. “Do I have any other questions?” she asked with a laugh.