by Alison Ryan
“Dad,” I said. “He’s Mozart. One of the great geniuses of our time. I don’t think he minded. Like you said, if something is your destiny, it’s going to happen either way. There’s no other choice.”
“Maybe so,” Dad replied. “You know, his rival, Salieri, used to say Mozart was in direct contact with God. Because he could compose so quickly and beautifully, like God Himself was dictating the notes to Mozart. He was definitely touched by something. Every time I come here, I think of that. Of destiny, of whether everything is predetermined.”
It was an odd conversation to be having with him. There were layers to it that I couldn’t see. What we were talking about wasn’t really what we were talking about.
“I don’t think so,” I said. “Nothing is predetermined. We get to choose. I plan on choosing what I want to do with my life. I haven’t figured it out yet, but I know when I do, it won’t be because of anything but my own volition.”
My father looked at me, surprised. As if he was seeing me for the first time.
“Camilla, that makes me proud to hear you say that,” he said. “Yes. Choose your life. Make it what you want it to be. It’s a lesson I wish I had learned earlier. That I had choices. That I didn’t have to do what was asked of me or expected.”
“What do you mean?” I asked. We were on the edge of a breakthrough. I could feel it.
My father paused for a long moment. I could tell he was mulling over something.
“Another time,” he finally said. “We will talk about that further down the road. Just know I am proud of you, Camilla. And I always will be.”
Four
I was thinking about that trip to Austria as I flew on a private plane for the second time in my life, across the country to Tahoe. Everything Nolan Weston told me had worked out smoothly. I’d packed, been picked up in a black SUV, and been taken to the small private airport in Charlottesville where a Gulfstream jet awaited me.
And now I was trying not to cry thinking about talking to my father about Mozart when I was sixteen years old. And how we’d never gone back to the topic of destiny or how my father had been talked into his own, long before I even existed. And we never would. It broke my heart.
It was just me and the pilot on the plane. It had been almost dark when I boarded and now as we flew it felt like we were chasing the sun, going back into the past. I hadn’t travelled much to the western part of the States. My father had taken me to Disneyland when I was nine and my mother and I had gone to Palm Springs once for a spa weekend. Otherwise, it was a strange land to me. I looked out my window at the darkness, seeing great swaths of black only occasionally dotted by lights down below, the world closing down as I sped across it.
What was I to expect? Would I have to identify my father? Where would the funeral be? Where would he be buried? So many questions, the kind that made me nervous. My father’s firm was large, I assumed there would be a ton of things for me to sign, to consider, to learn. I didn’t want to do any of it.
I just wanted my father back.
********
It was a five-hour flight. By the time we reached South Lake Tahoe, California, I was exhausted in every way a person could be exhausted. I ached in my bones from the stress of what was happening. All I wanted was a bed and about 14 hours of uninterrupted slumber.
The plane taxied in, and before long we were disembarking. The pilot carried my bags down the stairs onto the tarmac. I took one last look at the interior of the plane, not sure what awaited me outside it. But somehow I knew nothing was ever going to be the same.
Outside the jet was yet another black SUV and a driver in a crisp suit, large and imposing. He nodded to me and took the bags from the pilot, placing them in the back of the car. The pilot opened the back passenger side door for me.
“Miss Hunt, I am truly sorry for your loss,” he said. “I hope your stay here in Tahoe is as pleasant as possible under these circumstances.”
“Thank you,” I said. “I appreciate that.”
The large Secret Service looking dude climbed into the driver’s side and slowly drove us off the tarmac and toward wherever our final destination would be.
“Where are you taking me?” I asked. “I thought I was supposed to meet Nolan Weston.”
“Mr. Weston is waiting for you at your father’s home,” the driver said. “Which is where I am taking you. Do you need to stop for anything on our way?”
I shook my head, “No. Thank you for asking.”
The driver looked at me through the rearview mirror, “I’m sorry too, Miss Hunt. My name is Michael by the way. I will be your driver while you’re here in Tahoe. Mr. Weston can provide you with my contact information should you need me for anything. A pretty big storm is coming through in the next couple of days so it may be hard to get in and out. They’re expecting a couple feet of snow out where Mr. Hunt’s home is.”
Great, I thought. Just what I needed.
I nodded and quietly stared out the window into the night. It was dark out here in South Lake Tahoe, but I could see the shadows of the Sierra Nevada looming over us as we glided toward my destiny, something that I wanted no part of.
********
I knew my father was wealthy. It was part of my life, his money, and I’d never been in the dark about that. Even though I barely saw him, I’d wanted for nothing. My mother and I had lived in a large house in Virginia before her death, paid for by him. Obviously he’d taken me on the very expensive trip to Austria for my 16th birthday. He’d also sent me to expensive camps every summer in places like upstate New York where I sweated in cabins with other rich kid types. I went to Choate Rosemary Hall, one of the most expensive boarding schools in the country. I’d taken equestrian classes and piano lessons. Before Choate I’d had tutors come to my mother’s home to teach me Latin, the Classics, French, and Trigonometry. I was well educated, well bred, and definitely the daughter of a rich man. I was no stranger to large homes, expensive cars, and rich people’s kids. I’d been surrounded by wealth and opulence my entire life.
But my father’s home in Tahoe was something that stunned even me.
It was expansive, for one thing. It sat on top of a mountain, one the driver had to drive slowly up in order for us to even get to the imposing gate that stopped any approaching vehicles before they could even glimpse the house. The property overlooked the tranquil Lake Tahoe and was surrounded by pines, but not hidden by them. It couldn’t be. The home was much too large for such a thing.
As we pulled up the long drive and around the final bend that brought everything into view, I stared, awestruck. This had to be my father’s main home. I’d visited him at his Manhattan apartment, his house in Newport, Rhode Island, which was very grand, and his beach house in West Palm Beach. But Tahoe was something completely different.
He’d never even told me about it. So this would be the first secret revealed.
Michael pulled up next to the entrance, which was an enormous paneled door made out of what was probably wood from a Sequoia. It looked like the perfect sort of door for this impenetrable fortress of a house. This wasn’t a house. It was a compound.
Why had my father needed a place like this?
Michael came around to open my door, but I was already halfway out of the car, my Burberry duffel bag over my shoulder. I took in the entirety of the house, not knowing what to expect. The mountain air had a sharpness to it, and I inhaled deeply, feeling a cold freshness down deep in my lungs.
My father had lived and died here. And now I was here to clean up the mess, while also dealing with my own grief. I inhaled again and then exhaled slowly. This would be the hardest thing I might ever do. But he’d want me to be strong. He believed in me.
“Mr. Weston is inside,” Michael said. “I’ll grab your luggage, Miss Hunt. The door should be unlocked.”
It was weird to walk through a door without knocking, but I guessed this was my house now, legally speaking. So it was silly to knock. But it still felt… odd.
/> The foyer of the home was as impressive as the exterior. It led to an open living room decorated in rich, rustic colors and décor. Very mountain-esque. The windows to the living room were floor to ceiling, and the ceiling was two levels above my head, affording an impressive view of the lake. Outside, I could see the ground sloped down to a pool (which was covered for the winter) and a hot tub, which was not.
“Jesus, Dad,” I said to myself. “You really outdid yourself.”
I could see the moon’s reflection in the great Lake Tahoe, and a billion stars shown over it, not dimmed a bit by the casinos and hotels on the far side of the lake. I was in my own world on this side. Another planet practically.
I dropped my bag to the floor and walked over to the plush sectional couch of the living room, collapsing on it.
“I see you made it okay,” a deep voice said from behind me. I recognized it immediately. It was Nolan Weston.
I didn’t bother turning around, “You sound disappointed.”
“Of course not,” he said. “I just know it was a sudden trip to be taking after getting the worst kind of news a person can get. So it’s good to see you made it here safely and can now take a moment for yourself.”
I rolled my eyes, “Did you rehearse that?”
He sighed, “No. I meant it. I can’t imagine how you’re feeling right now.”
I turned around to ask him what he could imagine, and I gasped.
This trip was truly full of surprises.
Nolan Weston stood behind me in a cable knit sweater and dark denim jeans. He was tall, with dark slicked back hair, and a rugged face. He looked like something straight out of a Brooks Brothers catalog. He had the slightest graying at his temples but that didn’t matter. I immediately recognized him.
Nolan Weston was not just any of my father’s attorneys. He was the new guy from years ago. The one we’d met in Salzburg. Or the one my father had met in Salzburg and I had spied on.
I wasn’t sure what to say next. All I knew is that things had just gotten a hell of a lot more interesting.
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