“He wants to remain anonymous,” Gus said as he pretended to look out the carriage window.
“Nick?” He had both the money and the guilty conscience. She bet it was Nick.
“Like I said . . . he wants to be anonymous.”
“I think it’s Nick. The only other person I know with that kind of money is Doctor Clean, and he thinks I belong in jail.”
“It wasn’t Doctor Clean. Let’s drop the subject, shall we? You’re free. Enjoy every moment. The laboratory students are planning a celebration in Central Park this evening. There’s a Shakespeare play, and then a picnic under the stars. Dr. Leal and all the others will be there. Do you want to go?”
She drew a deep breath, savoring the taste of clean, fresh air. “Yes.” The prospect of an evening under the stars with good friends was energizing. “Yes, I’d like to go. But who paid for the lawyer?”
“Rosalind, why does it matter?”
“It matters because I don’t like being indebted to anyone.” Especially Nick. She needed to put their brief, glorious fling behind her and move forward without any lingering obligations.
A sense of well-being flooded her the instant she stepped back inside her cottage. How she had missed this! The scent of lemon polish and cedar planking. Her cozy mantelpiece filled with handmade music boxes and windowsills lined with potted herbs. She would not cry. She was a strong woman with newfound resolve, and she wouldn’t become a blubbering watering pot, but oh, this was wonderful.
Ingrid proved typically chilly as she descended the staircase to greet Rosalind, but the baby sent her a huge, drooly smile and a shriek of joy.
“Hello, Jonah,” Rosalind said, working once again to control her surge of weepy joy as she kissed the baby’s soft hair and breathed his powdery smell. “Thank you for all the baking you did,” she said to Ingrid. “The women and I deeply appreciated all your homemade cookies.”
“Of course,” Ingrid said with a regal nod. It was hard to read her, and Rosalind didn’t have the energy to try.
“Well. I think everyone would appreciate it if I went for a quick bath.”
She needed to escape, partly because she was filthy, but just as much because she didn’t want to ruin the afternoon by blubbering in front of anyone. Wasn’t it strange how this surge of emotion seemed to keep coming in waves? Just when she’d found her footing, the littlest thing, like the scent of Jonah’s baby powder caught her by surprise and made her weepy again.
Twenty minutes later, she was freshly bathed, powdered, and changed into a clean dress. She spritzed herself with a generous splash of her favorite lemon verbena cologne. Most importantly, she was composed. It had taken a while to collect her senses and calm her tumult of emotions, but she was safe and would handle the future with well-prepared rationality.
Dinner preparations were under way when she emerged downstairs.
“That smells delicious,” she said to Ingrid’s back as her sister-in-law whisked flour into gravy. “Is there anything I can do to help?”
Ingrid looked over her shoulder. “You can lay the table.”
Gus cleared his study materials off the table, and Rosalind reached for a tablecloth, but something looked different in the tiny area. The furniture was the same, as were the gingham curtains on the window.
There was a new picture above the sideboard. Some sort of framed legal document, almost like a stock certificate, except plainer. She stepped closer, but without her spectacles, it was impossible to read the small print.
“What’s this?” she asked as she reached for her spectacles. A patent? Fancy, boldly embossed letters proclaimed it was from the United States Patent Office, but smaller print below looked like it had been banged out on a typewriter:
The Frieda and Augustus Werner Freshwater Chlorinator
The breath froze in her throat. She glanced at the name of the patent holder: George Warren Fuller. She barely knew him. Mr. Fuller certainly didn’t know what had happened to her parents or even their given names.
She clamped a hand over her chest to still the pounding of her heart. “Why would Mr. Fuller name the patent after Mama and Papa?”
Gus stood directly behind her, a reluctant smile on his face. “I guess he already has so many patents that he didn’t mind sharing the stage.”
“But why? And why Mama and Papa?”
“Someone asked him.”
“You?”
He shook his head. “Not me.”
It had to have been Nick. He was the only one who knew she feared her parents would be forgotten. Oh, Mama . . .
They would forever burn brightly in her memory, but now her parents’ sacrifice would be remembered. She’d worked for years to ensure they had not died in vain. Never had she imagined they would be memorialized in such a fashion, and it got to her.
The first snivels caught her unaware. She clamped a hand over her mouth to block the tremors of weeping. She turned away and shut her eyes, causing two fat tears to roll down her face. Despite her effort, gulping sobs slipped out anyway. She was helpless against the weeping that began deep inside and welled up, causing her to shake with repressed tears.
Gus’s hands were heavy on her shoulders. “Don’t cry, Rosalind. . . .”
She couldn’t help it. She didn’t know if she was happy or grateful or mourning the loss of her parents afresh . . . all of it, probably. The weeping turned heavier, engulfing her whole body and making it impossible to stand upright. She curled over. Weeping turned into sobs, and then sobs turned into bawling. Gus guided her to a chair, even as huge, wrenching sobs made it hard to walk. Fat tears splatted onto her skirt. She cried so hard she could barely breathe.
“Please stop,” Gus said. “You’re scaring me. You’re scaring the baby. Heck, you’re even scaring Ingrid.”
A gulp of laughter mingled with her tears, for Ingrid stood motionless in the kitchen, watching her as if waiting for a bomb to explode.
“I’ll be okay,” she said, wiping the tears from her face. This had just taken her by surprise, and it was all too much. Nick wasn’t a perfect man, but it hurt to remember how generous and thoughtful he could be.
“Do you still want to go to the park?” Gus asked. “I’m sure the others will understand if you’d rather stay home.”
The crying jag had sapped her energy, but it would be good to go out with the students. She owed them so much, as they had carried out her duties during the final days while she’d been incarcerated. It was time to resume her normal life.
And she needed to get her mind off Nick. Her gaze trailed to the patent, the most thoughtful gift she’d ever been given. Her debts to him were growing, and the prospect of getting sucked back into the vortex surrounding him was terrifying.
Yes, a night of Shakespeare in the park was exactly what she needed.
Nick’s conversation with Colin and Lucy confirmed his determination to win Rosalind back. When Lucy and Colin talked about the coming baby, they had the cautious gratitude of soldiers emerging from a hard-won battle. It was not undiluted happiness, but a quiet kind of confidence that came from surviving life’s challenges alongside a partner. He hadn’t realized the private struggles they’d been fighting, but they had persevered and were the stronger for it.
He wanted that sort of life with Rosalind. Life was short, and neither of them were perfect. He hadn’t been fair to her in assuming she was.
According to the warden at the jail, she had been released shortly after lunchtime. The first thing he did upon arriving home after work was place a telephone call to her house.
A male voice answered on the other end. “Hello?”
“I’d like to speak with Rosalind, please.”
Even across the telephone wires, Nick could hear the reluctance in Gus’s voice. “I don’t think she wants to speak with you.”
It would serve him right if Rosalind refused to ever speak to him again, but they owed it to one another to clear the air. He would never stop hoping they could work toward a
reconciliation, and that meant not letting her brother bully him into giving up too easily.
“I don’t have time for this. Just get her on the phone.”
“Why should I?”
“Because it is her house, her telephone, and her service that she is paying for. Now get her on the phone,” he barked.
“She isn’t here.”
Nick rocked back on his heels. “It’s seven o’clock in the evening. Where is she?” If Rosalind had another suitor, it would only be natural for her to want to spend her first night of freedom with him, but the thought scorched.
“She wouldn’t want me to say. And besides, she would kill me if she learned that I told you she went to see the Shakespeare play tonight in the park. And that she’s with the entire crew of lab assistants, who plan to have a picnic under the stars near Summit Rock. She would really hate that.”
Nick smiled and bowed his head in gratitude. “Thanks, Gus.”
Chapter
Twenty-Two
Rosalind hoped the play would be one of Shakespeare’s comedies, but no such luck. It was the eternally moody Hamlet with his complicated family.
She sat on a blanket in the park and gave up concentrating on the play. On her first night of freedom, she wondered what Melinda, Gabriella, and all the other women in the jail were doing right now. She wondered if her reputation would ever be restored. But most of all she wondered about Nick.
According to Gus, this entire fraud had been cooked up by Nick’s vengeful aunt, so it would make sense for him to help her get out of jail. But getting the chlorinator patent named after her parents? That went beyond the call of duty. She couldn’t stop thinking of the way he’d looked, clinging to that tree outside her jail window. “I wanted to be the first man to dance in the streets if chlorine worked.”
She had gone dancing with the lab students instead, who led her in an impromptu jig when a pair of buskers played the fiddle before the performance started. It had been a nice sentiment. Everything about her and Nick’s early days had been fabulous, a wild and glorious free fall with no limits and no caution. It couldn’t have lasted, but she would always regret the way it ended.
A student hunkered down on the blanket beside her. “Hello, Dr. Werner.”
She gasped and whirled, for it was Nick alongside her, his face brimming with tenderness. She instinctively pulled back a few inches.
“Did Gus tell you I was here?”
The corners of his eyes crinkled in pained amusement. “Will there be a death in the family if I say he did?”
Maybe it was just as well. She and Nick had too much unfinished business for her to keep avoiding him. And the play was depressing.
“Thank you for the patent,” she said.
If there was any doubt that he was behind the patent, it vanished as his eyes warmed and he leaned in. “You liked that, did you?”
“Shh!” someone said behind them.
“Let’s go for a walk,” he suggested, holding out his hand. It would be so easy to take it and slip back into his world.
“Let’s watch the end of the play,” she whispered. “Ophelia just drowned herself in the castle pond, but Hamlet doesn’t know yet.”
“I’ll bet that’s going to ruin their water supply for weeks,” Nick said.
She stifled a snort of laughter, causing the lady in front of her to turn and shoot her a glare.
“Come on, let’s go,” Nick prodded. “Hamlet is awful. Everyone dies in the end.”
“Shh!” This time the person behind them gave Nick a shove to the shoulder.
“Please, Rosalind . . . we have business to discuss.”
It was true. She took his hand and let him pull her upright. They picked their way through the crowd to the grassy lawn in the distance. After they reached the wood-chip path, she took care to keep an arm’s distance from him. Chemistry thrummed between them, just as it always did when they were together, and she had to handle this cautiously. Not like before, when she rushed headlong into his arms, heedless of the consequences or even knowing who he really was before she fell under his spell.
They headed toward a pond surrounded by a line of maple trees. With fewer lampposts, it was darker here, but she still sensed every square inch of Nick’s presence as he walked beside her. The air was alive with sound. The squawking of a mockingbird was surprisingly loud, and the drone of crickets mingled with rustling leaves.
“You ought to love this,” Nick said. “All this outdoors and your beloved green canopy.”
She caught her breath. “You remember that?”
“I remember everything.” His voice sounded profoundly sad. “I remember being so dazzled by you that I could barely string a sentence together. I remember marveling at how a lady could be so delicate and dainty while also being so smart and committed to a cause. I wondered how a working-class guy like me could have a chance with a woman like you, but by some miracle, I did. And then everything fell apart so quickly.”
“It’s probably just as well,” she said. After the day at the courthouse, she swore she’d never forgive him . . . but did she really want to carry that grudge for the rest of her life? Nick’s temper often got the better of him, but it always blew over eventually. And she wasn’t a shrinking violet anymore. If she could stand up to Melinda, she could stand up to anyone.
“It’s not just as well,” Nick pressed. “And besides, I think we can work together. If not on a personal level, then a professional one. General O’Donnell wants to consider chlorination in New York. You could help us with that.”
“So could Dr. Leal.”
“I want you, and I’m the man who signs the contracts.”
She halted. He was moving too fast again, and even talking about contracting with New York was ridiculous at this hour of night. “Who paid for my lawyer?”
He slanted her a look, as though she were an idiot.
“Thank you. I’ll figure out some way to pay you back.”
“Come do a little consulting on the New York water project, and I’ll consider it paid off.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. You’re just doing this because you feel guilty. Or you’re hoping to start things up again, and that’s not going to happen.”
“I’ve already got the contracts prepared and ready to sign. Dr. Leal told me he’s going to spend most of the next few years traveling, and a lot of cities will be skeptical of you because you’re a woman. If you’re the lead consultant in New York City, no one will doubt you. Come by my office Monday morning, and you can sign the contract.”
Her mind worked quickly, a niggling sense of pride stirring to life. She’d never been hungry for fame, but working on the largest water system in the nation would be an important step. Everything he said about some cities refusing to work with a woman was true.
“What about the other commissioners? Will they object to having me as a consultant?” She didn’t need to mention her tattered reputation. Given the grim set of Nick’s mouth, he was already thinking about it.
“Maybe, maybe not,” he finally said. “Fletcher can be a real stick in the mud.”
“Then I want to sign the contract tonight.” He looked stunned at her agreement, and she followed up with her reasoning. “If the contract is signed, there won’t be much Fletcher Jones can do, right?”
Nick smiled widely, looking deliciously masculine, pleased, and roguish. “I like the way you think.”
The magnetic spell was weaving itself around them again, and she took a cautious step back. “If I sign the contract, you know it doesn’t mean anything beyond water. H20 and chlorine, right?”
“If that’s all I can get.” He spoke with the forthright confidence she’d always admired. “I knew within five minutes of meeting you that we both wanted the same thing. Clean water. Then the personal stuff got in the way. I still want that personal stuff, I can’t lie about that . . . but if a straightforward business relationship is all you can offer . . . well, I’m a patient man.”
They took a streetcar to Nick’s office building. There was nobody on the top floor, and their footsteps echoed in the long, tiled hallways as they headed toward the suite of offices where Nick worked. His keys jangled as he unlocked the first door, then led her through the reception area and toward another set of closed doors leading to the private offices. Only a little light leaked in through the windows, and the desks and filing cabinets loomed like dark shadows in the silent office.
“This is where I work,” Nick said as he unlocked the door to a private office. There was a hint of hesitancy in his voice as he led her inside. With a metallic click, he pulled the lever on the brass electrical plate, then switched on a lamp sitting on his desk. “This is my office,” he said unnecessarily. Normally he was so confident, but not now. He looked at her with caution on his face and shifted his feet. He was nervous, anxious for her approval.
“Very nice,” she said simply. “Where’s the contract?”
“Oh, um . . . let me find the papers. I wasn’t expecting to do this until next week.”
While he sorted through stacks of files on his desk, she scanned the office. There was the desk on one side and a huge conference table on the other. Bookshelves had been built into the wall, most of them weighed down with pedestrian-looking manuals. A few of the shelves had elegant wooden accordion doors that could be rolled back to reveal a hidden cubby. Each accordion door had a tiny brass lock on it, but the keys were in the locks, so there probably weren’t state secrets inside. She grasped one of the keys to lift the door, impressed by its smooth glide. She wasn’t sure what to expect inside the cubby, but a miniature dollhouse certainly wasn’t it. There was also a rag doll and a tin of chocolates.
She swiveled to look at Nick, who was still riffling through files, but he grinned when he saw where she was looking.
“Sometimes Sadie visits me in the office, and I can’t have her getting too bored.”
The cubby door glided silently closed as she lowered it back into place. Higher up was another accordion door, and this time she saw the typical male forbidden fruit. A box of imported cigars and a half-full bottle with a familiar label.
A Daring Venture Page 27