The Complete Legacy Series: Books 1 - 6

by Paula Kay

  Chapter 30

  Gigi had been very excited and totally on board when Jemma had shared with her that she wanted to go to Italy—to study art and to paint. That was her future; she’d known it from the moment Gigi had shown her the art studio just a short week ago.

  Once she’d shared her idea with Gigi, the wheels were in motion. Gigi had fired off an e-mail to Lia and soon after, Jemma was talking to Lia on the phone, accepting an invitation to come stay with them at the vineyard for as long as she liked—she’d said that Gabriela loved the idea and now couldn’t stop talking about it.

  This news had made Jemma smile. Lia and Antonio had adopted Gabriela from Casa de los Niños six years ago when she’d been only one, and she’d been a perfect fit for the whole extended family.

  Jemma was getting more excited every day and by the time Gigi had finally told her that they’d all be going to Italy with her—she, Douglas, and Jemma’s whole family—to see her off on this next adventure in her life, Jemma could hardly contain her excitement.

  It had been long enough that she’d been apart from her family. She was ready to see them all. She and Gigi would meet them in San Diego and then they’d head to Italy. Douglas would meet them a few days later once Tori and the other volunteers were all set to take over from him at the orphanage.

  Everything was coming together and now she was having the best birthday of her life, celebrating at the party that the children had put together for her.

  “Well, that sure looks like the smile of one happy birthday girl.”

  Rafael came up to her, pulling her in for a big hug.

  Jemma felt herself grinning, the way she always did when Rafael was nearby, always so complimentary and positive.

  He stood back from her with that intense stare he often had.

  “What?” Jemma laughed, swiping her hand across her mouth at imaginary crumbs. “Is there something on my face.”

  “It’s just—it’s nice to see you looking so happy.” He was smiling at her.

  She returned the smile. “I am happy—happier than I’ve been in a long time.”

  “Good. You deserve it. And happy birthday.” He grew somber. “I’m really gonna miss you, Jemma.”

  Jemma reached out to take his hand. “I’m going to miss you too, Rafael. A lot. Thank goodness for technology these days—you have to promise me that you’re going to keep in touch.”

  Rafael was nodding his head as Jemma pulled him out of the way to a quieter place in the open space where the kids were dancing and having a good time.

  “I want to tell you something.”

  Jemma was a little nervous and she wasn’t sure why exactly.

  Rafael looked slightly nervous too, and she could tell by the look on his face that he wasn’t at all sure about what Jemma was about to tell him.

  Jemma laughed to lighten the mood. “It’s nothing bad.” She smiled at him. It wasn’t bad at all. If only he would take her up on her offer.

  “Okay. Are you going to make me guess?” He winked.

  “No. No guessing necessary. I’d like to offer you a business proposition.”

  Rafael looked confused.

  “For the construction company you want to start.”

  She saw Rafael’s face soften and the light come into his eyes as it often did when he talked to her about the business he wanted to start.

  “Okay. Go on.”

  “I’ve talked to Douglas about a few different ways that we could structure it. What I’d like to do is go into partnership with you. I’ll put up the money—for whatever you need to get going, including your living costs for the move to the city—and you’ll run everything. I’ll be a silent partner. Don’t worry.” She laughed.

  “Wow. Jemma, I don’t know what to say.”

  “Or—I have one other idea—before you say anything. I could also just make you a loan, leaving me out of the business entirely. I’m good with whatever you decide.” She grinned, hoping that he could feel her genuine desire to want to help him realize his own dreams as she was also moving toward hers. “I just want to help you make this happen, Raf. And it’s an easy thing for me to do—now that I have the money—so you have to say yes, okay?”

  She was batting her eyelashes at him—fake flirting, he’d been calling it lately.

  He pulled her in for a hug. “Thank you. I don’t know what to say. I really can’t believe that you’d do that for me.”

  “Of course.” She gave him a long look. “You’ve been a good friend to me, Rafael. I won’t forget that.” She wiped a tear away as they hugged again.

  Chapter 31

  Jemma had been getting up early to paint ever since they’d arrived in Tuscany a week ago. Each morning she tried to capture the colors of the sun rising beyond the vineyard. It was more beautiful than anything she’d ever seen, and she couldn’t seem to get the colors in her painting just right to describe the scene in front of her. The fact that Lia and Antonio had set up an easel for her, both outside on the patio and in the spacious room they’d given her in the large villa, had meant everything to her.

  The past months—years even—of her teen-age life were a blur. The past was forgotten and her future welcomed with arms wide open by those who had loved her for most of her life—all of them just as supportive of her as they’d ever been.

  She shivered in the crisp morning air, pulling her sweater tighter around her, turning her head toward the sound of the door opening to the outside patio.

  “Morning. I brought you something—if you can take a break.”

  Jemma smiled when she saw her mom putting the two coffee cups down on the patio table, a light steam coming off them and a smell that brought with it a flash of memory from her childhood—she must have been about eight at the time.

  Her mom had always been so amazed when she’d find her out on the deck sketching or painting with her watercolors as the sun came up. She’d make Jemma a cup of hot chocolate, just the way she loved it—with warm milk and real whipped cream—and they’d sit out on the deck quietly together. Sometimes they’d talk, but often her mother would just sit and watch her paint while she sipped her coffee.

  Jemma came over to where her mom sat now and wrapped her arms around her from behind. “You’re up early too.” She kissed her on the cheek before she sat down opposite her, breathing in the steam from the warm chocolate before she took a first sip. “Just the way I love it.” She smiled at her mom. “Thank you.”

  Blu looked at her intently and Jemma thought her eyes looked teary.

  “What is it? Are you okay?”

  Blu was nodding her head but a few tears had made their way down her face.

  “Mom? What?”

  “Honey, I’m just so proud of you.”

  Jemma’s heart stopped beating so fast as she relaxed enough to hear the words her mom was telling her.

  “I was just watching you—from the window—while you were painting.”

  Jemma reached over to hold her mom’s hand. “I know. I’ve come a long way. I’ve changed, I suppose—which is a good thing, right?” She laughed.

  “You’ve made some wonderful decisions about your future and I see the changes that you’ve made since—since you found out the truth, yes. But I want you to know that I—Chase and I—never doubted you. Not really. I knew that you’d come around and I’m just so thankful that everything has turned out the way that it has.”

  Jemma was wiping at some tears now too. She hadn’t actually known that she was going to turn out alright—not at all—not until she’d arrived at the orphanage. “I think I owe a lot to Gigi and Douglas, you know?”

  “Yes, I do know.” Blu squeezed her hand. “We’re very lucky, aren’t we?”

  Jemma nodded and the two sat in comfortable silence for a few minutes before Blu’s phone on the table buzzed with a notification. Blu glanced at it and went back to its home screen, grinning as she held it up so that Jemma could see it.

  “I couldn’t bear to leave it beh
ind, so I took a picture of it.”

  It was the portrait that Jemma had painted for her mom while she was at the orphanage—of the two of them with Arianna. Douglas had had it shipped to California and when her mom had received it, she’d called Jemma in tears. Jemma smiled now as she looked at the image on the phone. She had done a good job capturing their expressions—it had turned out exactly as she’d wanted it to.

  “I can remember that day as if it were yesterday.” Blu smiled as she recounted what Jemma had heard before.

  *“That was the day you met Chase.” Jemma interjected, grinning.

  “Well, yes. But also it was just a really good day. Arianna had still been feeling well then and we’d had so much fun with you at the beach and sipping wine outside on the deck.”

  Jemma watched her mom’s face as she looked out toward the expansive view of the vineyard.

  “Ari would have loved it here—and to see you all grown up.” Blu smiled at her. “She’d be just as proud of you as I am—as we all are.”

  “Ari’s a big part of our lives—even now, I mean—isn’t she?” Jemma had been thinking about Arianna a lot lately, poring over the photos that she had of her and trying to remember every detail of the memories that she did have of the times that she’d spent with her as a child.

  “She is, yes.” Blu reached over to take her phone from Jemma, looking at the picture again. “I’m glad that you can remember her.”

  “Me too,” Jemma said and they finished their hot chocolate in silence, Jemma remembering the young woman who had meant so much to her—who had done so much for her—and guessing that her mom’s thoughts were much the same.

  Chapter 32

  Jemma looked around the table at all the people she loved. Her family.

  She watched Lia bring out the heaping plates of food—the pastas and the meat dishes that always tasted so much more delicious when they were eating them in Italy all together at the villa. Jemma loved it there. She’d forgotten how much. She and Lia had had a long walk the night before and she’d told Jemma that she was welcome to stay at the villa with them as long as she liked—that she always had a room there—and that Gabriela was beyond excited about having her there.

  They were all seated now, Gabriela and Kylie laughing at one end of the table, Antonio pouring the wine. He’d said it was one of the finest from their vineyard, and after some discussion between Blu and Lia, they’d all agreed that it was fine for Jemma to be drinking one glass of wine with dinner while she was in Italy. Jemma had laughed when they’d had the discussion. Her drinking days were behind her now, but she appreciated that they were all treating her like the adult she now was.

  A lot was behind her—all of the bad stuff anyway. She was determined to have the future that Arianna had imagined for her when she’d set up Jemma’s trust—a future that she could be passionate about and proud of.

  Antonio was standing at one end of the table, his glass raised, ready to make a toast.

  “Honey, can you put your phone away?” Gigi was saying to Douglas.

  Jemma glanced over toward them, laughing because it was unusual for Douglas to need to be told such a thing. He had better manners than most men Jemma knew. But now he had a very funny look on his face as he put his phone down.

  “You guys aren’t going to believe this.”

  All eyes were on him and Jemma thought he looked like he’d gone a little pale.

  “What it is? Is everything alright?” Lia asked.

  “I just got an e-mail.” He hesitated for a moment. “From a young girl in Connecticut who says that she’s Arianna’s daughter.”

  Jemma saw the shocked look pass between Lia and Antonio, and she wasn’t exactly sure why but her heart skipped a beat at the magnitude of what Douglas was telling them all in that moment. Even Gabriela and Kylie had stopped their chatter to stare intently at Douglas. He was smiling widely at Gigi, who had reached out to hold his hand beside him.

  “Her name is Isabella.”

  Legacy Series

  (Book 6)

  All in Good Time

  By

  Paula Kay

  Copyright © 2015 Paula Kay

  Cover design by Beetiful Book Covers

  All rights reserved.

  PaulaKayBooks.com

  Chapter 1

  Isabella Dawson wiped the vomit from her chin as she sat back against the bathtub. God, why did she have to get so worked up about everything? She was well prepared with her speech. Her parents had made sure that she’d had plenty of practice, listening to her recite the words that she’d be saying in front of the entire school in just two short hours.

  She looked toward the knock at the door and smoothed her long dark hair back as she stood up to brush her teeth.

  “Izzy?”

  She rolled her eyes at the nickname. “Yeah, Mom.”

  “Iz, are you okay in there? Do you want to come out and do the speech for Dad and me one more time?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  No, I think I got it. Please leave me alone. And please stop calling me Izzy.

  She hated the nickname that she’d grown up with, and for the past few months she’d been really trying to get her parents to stop calling her Izzy—she wanted to be taken seriously at Harvard and she didn’t think Izzy was going to cut it for a future lawyer.

  Leo, the owner of the Italian restaurant that they loved to go to, always called her Bella whenever he saw her. It made her smile—she liked it better than Izzy—but she wasn’t sure that she was a Bella either.

  She was a serious young woman—that’s the way her teachers described her anyway—Isabella Dawson—high school valedictorian and future Harvard law student.

  No, she was way too serious to be a Bella.

  She peered into the bathroom mirror wondering if she had some make-up that could cover the darkness under her eyes. She hadn’t actually worn make-up since she’d first tried it two years ago. She’d begged her parents to let her wear it and they’d finally allowed her to once she’d turned sixteen. But then she always felt that they disapproved so she’d quit wearing it after only one week—besides, it always ended up running down her face during track practice anyway, so it was really more of a bother than anything.

  Her mother told her that she didn’t need make-up—that Isabella was a natural beauty—but Isabella always noticed a certain look on her mother’s face when she talked about her beauty. She’d always told Isabella that there were more important things than good looks—and they’d certainly raised her to think much more of her intellect and natural talents than anything else.

  She splashed some cold water on her face and stared into the dark brown eyes of her reflection looking back at her.

  You got this, Isabella. It’s no big deal. Just do it like you’ve practiced a hundred times.

  And even though she was feeling anxious, she knew that she’d pull it off. That her parents would be out in the seats watching her, their smiles wide with pride at the perfect speech that their daughter had delivered. They’d hug and kiss and then her father would take them out for an expensive dinner that was the very rare occasion within the Dawson household.

  She sighed as she dried her face off and prepared to walk out of the bathroom. She desperately wished that she had time for a quick run, but she knew that she didn’t. If she could make it past her parents—who she knew were waiting to accost her with all of their positive words—to her bedroom, she’d take a few minutes to do one of her journal exercises. That seemed to help lately.

  She hadn’t shared with her parents that she’d been meeting regularly with Ms. Carlson, the high school guidance counselor, for the entire last semester of her senior year. One day Ms. Carlson had come into the bathroom while Isabella had been throwing up. It was during finals and her nerves had been nearly shot from the anxiety of all the tests—the tests that she’d aced, of course, but her preparedness didn’t seem to help when it came to her need to do well. After a lengthy discuss
ion back in the counselor’s office, Isabella had finally convinced her that she didn’t have an eating disorder, but Ms. Carlson had been firm about Isabella setting up a next meeting with her. And that was how their regular Wednesday meetings came to be.

  Isabella fell a twinge of sadness now as she thought about the final meeting that she’d have with the woman who had become quite an important part of her life over the past months. Even though graduation was today and school was officially over, they had one more meeting scheduled for next week.

  Relieved that her parents had been in the other room when she’d come out of the bathroom, Isabella made it to her bedroom, where she pulled her journal out of her bedside table. She’d been keeping a journal for as long as she could remember—she’d been writing for as long as she could remember too. She’d gone from scribbling beginnings of stories on paper, to writing a full-size novel on the new lightweight laptop that her parents had given her for Christmas the past year. But almost no one knew about her intense love for writing. She had the feeling that the knowledge of it would somehow worry her parents—that somehow it would become a bigger thing than what it was. And she wasn’t kidding herself about a career as a writer. That was just a fun idea. Her goal throughout high school had been that she would become a successful lawyer one day, and everything that she’d worked so hard for had landed her a spot in one of the best schools in the country.

  Her journal had become more of a therapy tool for her lately. Ms. Carlson had helped her to realize that this intense amount of pressure she’d been heaping on herself was more than not just healthy—that it was really affecting her quality of life—a big life that she had in front of her—the big life that everyone wanted for her. She tried not to think about her parents as she turned to the task at hand.

  At the top of the page she wrote the big scary thing—the task that was making her feel anxious—valedictorian speech at graduation. Worst-case scenario—she’d completely space out on the whole speech, everyone would laugh at her and her parents would be incredibly embarrassed.