by Janet Dailey
But the trappings of Carnival made her wonder all the more why Marc Jardin was deliberately steering their conversation away from any discussion of what had transpired in Cole's office. Why wasn't he telling her who Brodie Donovan was? She remembered the way he'd glared at the portrait, and she was certain he'd overheard Cole assert that this Donovan man had founded the Crescent Line. Yet he'd said nothing about it, and given her no opening to ask him. By the same token, she hadn't forced the issue. Why was she reluctant to question him?
The opportunity to correct her self-imposed silence was lost as her uncle announced, "Here we are," and swung the Mercedes between two narrow wrought-iron columns, the scrolled gates of the mansion's former carriage entrance standing open to admit them. "It must be good to be home again after the ordeal you've been through."
"If you had said that to me two days ago, in Nice, I probably would have agreed with you," Remy replied as he parked the car in front of the old carriage house, which had been converted into a four-car garage. "Now I have a feeling that the ordeal has barely begun."
Saying nothing to that, he let a silence fall between them, a silence that seemed even more pronounced after the stream of banal conversation he'd maintained during the drive here, and it convinced Remy that her statement might be more accurate than she'd realized.
When they walked into the mansion through a side entrance, she was immediately greeted by an array of tantalizing aromas. Her uncle paused and inhaled deeply in exaggerated appreciation. "Smells like that Nattie has been baking up a storm already this morning."
"It's about time you got back here." At the end of the hall stood a tall, spare black woman, wearing a businesslike white apron tied firmly around a black uniform. Her hair was cut close to her head at the sides, then allowed to pouf in a mass of pepper-gray curls on top of her head, a cut that was both stylish and practical and that showed her high cheekbones to their best advantage. Her dark eyes narrowed on Remy. "It seems to me that knock on your head took away more than your memory. It took some good sense along with it— going off for a walk before it gets light."
"You must be Nattie." Remy walked toward the woman, waiting for the sight to spark some memory.
"Considering I'm the only black woman in this house, I don't see how you could mistake me for anyone else."
Remy laughed in surprise. "Are you always this blunt?"
"If I am, I got it from you." The quickness of her retort led Remy to believe this conversation might be typical of past exchanges.
"Where's—" Marc began.
"Mr. Frazier and Miss Sibylle's in the solarium having their morning coffee," Nattie interrupted, anticipating his question.
"I'll let them know you're home," he said to Remy, then set off, striding briskly toward the white-wood-and-glass room.
"They did find the note I left, didn't they?" Remy wondered, belatedly.
"I found it," Nattie replied, "when they had me take a tray of morning coffee up to your room. Right away your momma started worrying that if you'd lost your memory, how were you going to know where you lived to find your way back?"
"I promise you I could have."
"Try convincing her of that," Nattie countered, shaking her head in a gesture of exasperation.
Despite the familiar way the black woman spoke to her, Remy noticed that she hadn't once asked her where she'd gone or why she'd left or what she'd done. She remembered that Cole had said she regarded Nattie as practically one of the family, but obviously not to the extent that she felt she had to account to the woman for her comings and goings—and it was equally obvious that Nattie didn't expect her to.
Suddenly Nattie reached up and curved a pink-palmed hand against Remy's cheek. "I'm glad you're home. I was worried about you," she declared, a little too brusquely, then quickly drew away her hand. "I don't know why I'm standing around here talking to you when I've got work to do. Go tell your momma and papa breakfast will be on the table in twenty minutes. And ask Mr. Marc if he'll be staying."
"I will," Remy promised, but Nattie hadn't waited for a response as she started for the kitchen.
Smiling, Remy turned and moved off in the direction her uncle had taken earlier. Without Nattie's presence to distract her, she found her thoughts immediately swinging back to replay the morning's events—with Cole and with her uncle. As she approached the sun-filled solarium, she heard voices and automatically slowed her steps.
"It never occurred to me that Buchanan would shut you out of the meeting," came her father's voice, its muttering tone underscored with both irritation and worry. "This complicates things."
"That's a mild way of putting it," her uncle replied. "Now we'll have to look for some other way to find out what this so-called proof is that the insurance company claims to have. Until we know that, we can't be sure which will be the best way to proceed."
"Why don't you arrange to meet privately with the representatives from the insurance company —somewhere away from the office?" The suggestion came from Gabe. "Use the meeting as a means to express the family's concern about their allegations."
"However valid that reason is, at this stage, Gabe, I don't think it would be wise," Marc Jardin stated. "It could suggest to them that we think there might be some truth to their charges. We could lose a valuable negotiating edge that way."
"Truthfully," her father inserted, "I'm more concerned that the insurance company may carry out its threat to make this whole business about the Dragon public. A scandal like that would be extremely damaging."
"I wouldn't worry about that, Dad. You can bet the insurance company wants to avoid that as much as we do. But Marc's right. Before we can take any action, we have to find out what kind of case they have—if any."
"And Buchanan knows it," her father muttered. "That man is so damned cunning."
Remy used the pulsebeat of silence that followed to cross the last few feet to the solarium's open glass doors.
"Good morning." She felt the layer of tension in the room, a tension not betrayed in the smiles of its occupants—her father seated in a cushioned rattan chair, her mother at the serving cart stirring cream into a coffee cup, Gabe at the many-paned windows leaning a shoulder against the white framework, and her uncle, Marc Jardin, standing in the room's center, as if he'd halted in the act of pacing the room. "I'm supposed to inform you that breakfast will be on the table in twenty minutes—and to ask if you'll be joining us, Uncle Marc."
For an instant Remy was struck by the realization that although she recognized who each of them was, she didn't recognize any of them. They were family, yet they were still strangers—people she didn't remember. That was true even of Gabe and her mother. The childhood memories she'd recalled about her brother didn't tell her any more about the man he'd become than the fleeting image she'd remembered of her mother in the rose garden told her about what kind of woman she was. Unconsciously Remy tilted her chin a little higher and mentally tried to shake off the disturbing thoughts.
"I'm afraid I won't be able to stay for breakfast this morning—as much as I would like to indulge in some of Nattie's delicious blueberry muffins. I need to get back to the office." Marc Jardin set his cup and saucer on the serving cart.
Remy spoke up quickly to forestall his departure. "Before I came in, I overheard you talking —something about some allegations the insurance company is making against the shipping line? What's that all about?" As she glanced at each of them, she caught the quick looks they exchanged. "Is it something I'm not supposed to know about?"
"It doesn't matter if you know, Remy," her uncle declared, his smile gentle in its reproof. "They're simply taking issue with a claim we've made. You know how insurance companies are. You pay their outrageous premiums, and then when you file a major claim on a policy, they go through all the fine print to find a way to avoid paying up. Which is precisely what they're doing in this case."
Remy frowned. "But you made it sound so serious—"
"Aaah, Remy." Her uncle sighed a l
augh and curved an arm around her shoulder, giving her an affectionate squeeze. "Business is always very serious," he declared in an exaggeratedly sober tone, then looked at her father. "Frazier, do you remember when we decided it was time to change the company logo for the Crescent Line? We agonized and worried over that for more than a month."
"Gracious, yes," Sibylle Jardin inserted as she crossed the room to give Gabe the cup of coffee with cream. "The way they carried on and argued, you would have thought the fate of the world hung on their decision."
"See what I mean?" her uncle said, then gave her shoulder a pat and released her. "I've got to be going." Lending action to his words, he walked to the doorway and paused in the opening to look back. "I'll call you as soon as I know something, Frazier."
"Right."
Remy watched him leave, wondering whether the situation with the insurance company was as forthright as he'd made it sound, or if this was the trouble she had sensed. But how could it be? She took no active part in the operations of the shipping company; both Cole and Gabe had made that very clear. Therefore, she wouldn't be needed—not in the vital sense she felt—even if the shipping line were truly experiencing a crisis. It must be something else.
"Would you like some coffee, Remy?"
Remy turned from the now empty doorway. "Please," she said in acceptance, then observed the way her mother lightly pressed a hand on her husband's shoulder as she passed his chair—and the way he reached up and absently patted it— an exchange that spoke of affection given and returned, of a bond apparently strengthened by thirty-five years of marriage.
It made her wonder if she'd observed such exchanges before—or if she'd taken them for granted.
She watched her mother pour coffee from the silver pot into a china cup, noticing the delicate look to her hands, the medium length of her clear-polished nails, and the half-moons at the base of them. The blue veins standing out along the backs of her hands were the only indication of age, their presence betraying an otherwise youthful appearance.
Lifting her glance, Remy saw that it was the same with her mother's face—the initial impression was one of youth, and only a closer look revealed the faintly crepey quality of the skin around the eyes and mouth. Yet none of it detracted from the quiet elegance, the aura of studied grace about her. Or from the inner strength Remy sensed she had—not the "steel magnolia" kind, but something gentler, warmer. She wondered what her relationship with this woman had been like. Had Sibylle Jardin been a role model for her? Had they been close? Somehow Remy couldn't imagine confiding her deepest secrets to the woman, but—she couldn't imagine quarreling with her, either.
As for her father, her relationship with Frazier Jardin was an even bigger mystery, since she remembered absolutely nothing about him. She glanced his way again, seeking some feature, some characteristic, some mannerism that might spark a memory, no matter how small. But there was nothing, nothing but the sight of his face, drawn in sober, thought-filled lines, the darkness of his eyes all shadowed with concern—or was it fear?
"Your coffee, Remy."
Distracted by the prompting statement, she looked away and took the cup and saucer Sibylle Jardin handed her. When she glanced back at her father, he had tipped his head down, and she was even less certain whether what she had detected in his eyes was fear or merely deep worry.
"Do you mind if we all adjourn to the dining room?" Gabe asked, pushing away from the window frame with a shove of his shoulder. "If we stay in here, I don't think I'll be able to resist the temptation to stretch out on that sofa and catch up on some of the sleep I lost flying halfway around the world and back."
"Tired, are you?" Remy smiled at him in sympathy, seeing the shadows, the puffiness around his eyes.
"Tired?" He raised an eyebrow, questioning her choice of words. "I feel like I need toothpicks to prop my eyelids open."
"Don't do it," she advised in mock seriousness. "It would definitely hurt."
"What's a little pain when you're numb with fatigue anyway?" he countered, walking over to her and draping an arm around her shoulders, leaning his weight on her. "I don't suppose I could persuade you to carry me to the dining room, could I?"
"As heavy as you are, I'd collapse before we made it to the door."
"I was afraid you'd say that." He straightened slightly but kept his arm around her, drawing her along with him as he set off for the dining room, followed by their parents. "Tell me, where did you get the energy to go for a walk so early this morning?"
"Easy. I was already halfway around the world; therefore all I had to do was fly back." It was a nonsensical exchange, yet Remy was conscious of how naturally she slipped into it with him. And that ease suggested a closeness between them that had transcended childhood.
"I wish I'd thought of that. Which shows you how tired I am," he said with a mock grimace of dismay. "So—exactly where did you go on this walk of yours?"
"I caught the streetcar and rode to Canal, then strolled through the Quarter. You'd be surprised how peaceful and quiet it is at that hour," she continued. "After that I stopped by the Café du Monde for coffee, then wandered along the riverfront for a while and suddenly found myself at the company wharf."
"The wharf." Beneath the shock in her father's voice, there was censure. "That area is no place for a decent young woman to be walking alone in.
"That was Cole's reaction when he found me there," Remy admitted as she turned in to the dining room, a study in orchid and soft, cool blues. The long walnut table held place settings for four, the richness of the wood gleaming beneath the light from the bronze doré chandelier overhead, a twin to the one in the main salon. On the marble top of the French Empire serving table sat a tall crystal pitcher full of freshly squeezed orange juice, along with four glasses. Remy slipped free of Gabe's draping arm and crossed to the serving table with its mirrored base—a "petticoat" table. "Actually Cole put it a bit more bluntly—something like, 'What the hell are you doing here?'"
"I wondered how you came to be with Buchanan this morning." Her father sat down at the head of the table.
"That's how." Setting her cup and saucer down on the marble top, she picked up the juice pitcher and filled two glasses, one for herself and one for her waiting brother. "Afterward he insisted that I ride to the office with him and take a taxi home from there." She gave Gabe his glass, then picked up her cup and went over to sit down. "But when we—"
"No, not there, Remy," her mother admonished when she started to pull out a chair. "That's where Gabe always sits."
She let go of the carved chair back as if the wood had become hot to the touch. She was stunned to discover how awkward and uncomfortable she suddenly felt. Another scene from another time sprang into her mind, a scene when she was seven or eight years old, a scene where her mother had informed her that she couldn't sit there—"That is Gabe's place"—a scene where she had childishly stomped her foot and protested, "But he always gets to sit next to Daddy."
Remy stared at the chair she'd almost sat in— the chair next to her father—and murmured, "I didn't remember."
"You can sit there, Remy." Gabe motioned her back to the chair. "I don't mind."
"No, I don't think so." She knew she'd be uncomfortable sitting there now. Instead she pulled out another chair, down the table from his. "I'd rather sit here."
"If you say so." He shrugged and sat down in his customary place.
Her father picked up the conversation as if the interlude over the chairs had never occurred. "It's curious that you weren't able to find a taxi at the Trade Mart. Usually there are several around in the morning."
"There were this morning, too," Remy admitted. "But I wanted to see the company offices."
"Why?" He gave her a startled look, his hand halting in the midst of reaching for the glass of orange juice Sibylle had set in front of him.
Rather than attempt to explain the vague feelings that had prompted her visit to the offices of the family's shipping line, Remy said inste
ad, "Curiosity, mainly. I wanted to see if I would remember it."
"And did you?" Gabe asked.
"As a matter of fact, I remembered the portrait of Grand-père that always hung on that one wall," she replied, just as the connecting door between the dining room and kitchen swung open and Nattie walked through, a tray balanced on her upraised palm. Frazier Jardin set his juice glass down again and leaned back in his chair, a smile lifting his somber features.
"Ahh, breakfast at last," he declared lightly. "It smells wonderful, Nattie."
"Of course it does," she retorted, and put a plate in front of him, laden with the morning's fare of eggs Benedict topped by lemony bright hollandaise sauce and garnished with fresh strawberries, raspberries, pineapple, and colorful kiwi. "Whatever I make always smells good and tastes better. You know that, Mr. Frazier."
"My waistline reminds me when I forget," he replied drolly.
Nattie chuckled and continued on to serve his wife.
"By the way," Remy said as she unfolded her napkin onto her lap, "would someone mind telling me who Brodie Donovan is? Cole claimed he started the Crescent Line. Is that true?"
Her father stiffened instantly, resentment and anger in every line of his face. "In the strictest definition, I suppose he did." He sliced off a portion of his eggs Benedict. "The man was a war profiteer who made a fortune running the blockade during the War Between the States. He smuggled in satins and silks, whiskey and wines, and endless other luxuries, selling them for high dollar at a time when the South was begging for medical supplies and drugs, food for the table, and blankets to keep its people warm. The ships, the company name, may have been his in the beginning, but it was a Jardin who made the Crescent Line a respected shipping company," he concluded forcefully, and Nattie made a scornful, disbelieving sound in her throat. Frazier immediately fired a look at her. "Is something wrong, Nattie?"
"Not with me." She set Remy's plate in front of her, then calmly met his gaze. "Is something wrong with you?"
He glared at her for an instant, then Gabe spoke up. "Wasn't it Balzac who said that all great fortunes have been founded on a crime?"