Her Mistaken Dream

by Brenda Barrett

  Hazel cracked her eye open and looked at Caitlin. "He said hello to me yesterday."

  "He did?" Caitlin didn't need to ask who he was. She knew Hazel was talking about Curtis Decker.

  "He asked me if I wanted to talk." Hazel sighed. "I think he knows that I am Sebastian's mother. I gave him my number and took his. Why else would he want to talk to me?"

  "Well," Caitlin said, "that's good, isn't it?"

  "Yes. Of course." Hazel looked around. "My only problem is I may not get the chance to talk to him this week. Baron is very ill and he needs to go to the States for treatment. I think he is on his last, Caity. I have to go with him as his wife."

  "Oh, when?" Caitlin asked.

  "After the wedding. Tomorrow evening. I won't even have time to sit around and chat with you and Brigid. And I am going to have to put the whole getting back Sebastian on hold for now."

  "I doubt there will be any sitting around and chatting with Brigid." Caitlin shrugged. "She and Nick are so into each other I doubt they realize that other people exist."

  "Hush." Hazel grinned. "When you find your guy it will be the same."

  "So how long will you be gone?" Caitlin asked, concerned.

  "I guess until Baron gets better or dies." Hazel shrugged. "I don't know. It sounds morbid when I say die, doesn't it? The truth is, I'll miss the old guy. He is nice but he has suffered so long. He can't breathe unassisted these days."

  "And he will be leaving you all of his money," Caitlin added.

  "Money that I am not sure I want anymore," Hazel said. "It’s not worth the hassle with the old man's children. Besides, if Curtis Decker wants to talk to me, maybe it is because he knows that what his parents did was wrong and maybe he wants me to meet my child…to be a part of his life. That's really all I've ever wanted."

  "That and to have your own cooking show," Caitlin murmured.

  "Yes, yes." Hazel laughed. "I am a lady of simple wishes."

  Caitlin hugged Hazel and laughed. "I hope you get the desires of your heart, short sister."

  "I can't believe you two are having a sisterly moment and I wasn't invited," Brigid said from the top of the patio. Nick was directly behind her.

  Caitlin just smiled. The four sisters were expanding into exclusive twosomes. She knew that sisterly moments were going to become scarcer as time went by. It was enough to make a girl cry.

  *****

  Maybe that was why she contemplated calling Todd in the middle of the night after the rehearsal. She had helped Casey to move the last of her stuff to Luca's place. Casey was staying overnight at the Four Seasons with her family, Brigid was still out with Nick and she was alone in the apartment. She was feeling lonely—a rare occurrence for her. Growing up in a girl's home and sharing a room with Brigid had not given her time to be lonely. But then again, she was not just lonely; she was melancholy.

  She was feeling uncomfortably empty and as she listened to the steady, quiet ticking of the clock she found herself wanting to talk to Todd.

  She reached for her phone, her fingers scrolling through the list of contacts, searching for his number. Just then she paused. There were several reasons why she shouldn't be calling him. She enumerated them in her head, he was older than her. Much older, like sixteen years older.

  He was a little younger than her parents; when he was in high school she hadn't even been born yet. He was working when she was in kindergarten. He got married when she was just eight!

  He killed his wife when she was fifteen! Reason number two why she shouldn't even be thinking about him.

  She examined everything Todd had told her so far about himself and Rita. So they lost two babies and it derailed Rita a bit. She needed to know the extent of that derailment. Did she do something that caused Todd to defend himself and in the process kill her? Maybe it was an accident.

  She tossed in the bed and then threw off the covers. The AC was on but she still felt restless. She reached for her dream book in the semi-darkness. She had put it on the nightstand from the other day and hadn't had the time to go through it since that initial glance through.

  She turned on the bedside light and scanned through the notebook, running over her childish writings until she came to October 10 in the year she turned fifteen. That was the year she had a serious crush on Samuel Little, a guy in her high school physics class.

  The night after her birthday she had dreamt that she was standing in a garden beside a waterfall. There was a low stone wall surrounding the garden and he was right there sitting on the stone wall with a frown on his face. He looked sad, burdened in a way that she had felt was palpable.

  "Caitlin Denvers, I love you. I know I have no reason to ask this but I need you to wait for me."

  The dream hadn't lasted long. She hadn't even remembered what he wore. She just remembered the place and his face.

  That was the first time she had seen his face. And now that she thought about it, when she had the first dream in October, Rita had just died.

  Maybe it had been on the news? And she had formed her own fantasies around Todd. Because face it, he was handsome, pin-up worthy.

  She put down the book and rummaged through the box in her closet. At the very bottom were the pictures of him she had drawn. She pulled them out now and then laid them out on the bed; she had saved six of the drawings.

  She looked at them in earnest now, marveling at how well she had captured Todd's likeness. It was sort of eerie. If she hadn't experienced these dreams from when she was a child and had them come to pass she would find this unbelievable.

  She bundled up the pictures and placed them on her side table. She didn't know what to think.

  She looked at the clock; it was eleven o'clock. She couldn't call him now. She reached for the phone anyway, took a deep breath and pressed the call button.

  Todd answered on the first ring.

  "Caity." His voice was smooth and warm. It made her tongue-tied for a while. When he said Caity it was as if he caressed her name.

  She heard the song playing in his background. And she chuckled, "And I Love Her. That's a real oldie."

  Todd sang, "I give her all my love; That's all I do, And if you saw my love, You'd love her too."

  "You actually sound good," Caitlin said, genuinely shocked that he had such a beautiful singing voice.

  Todd laughed. "I am not as melodious as you were in church."

  "I am happy that I didn't see you before I started," Caitlin said softly, "I am not known for my singing but I heard the group practicing and I volunteered to sing. Maybe because it had a mix of African lyrics in there. My mom loved African music. She was South African, you know?"

  Todd cleared his throat. "You miss her, don't you?"

  "Yes, of course. She was the best Mom ever. My sister is getting married tomorrow. Would you like to be my plus one?" she asked in a rush.

  Todd didn't hesitate to answer. He didn't engage her in any whys, or why now. He simply said, "Yes."

  Caitlin breathed a sigh of relief.

  Chapter Eleven

  It was a romantic wedding; the ceremony was short. Casey and Luca had written their own vows and it was tear-inducing. Casey started out by saying, Dear Mystery Guy, I loved you then, I love you now, I'll love you forever.

  There wasn’t a dry eye in the place after they said their vows.

  The reception was also filled with happy moments, and she tried her best not to be distracted by Todd Taylor.

  She had barely gotten the chance to say hello to him and thank him for coming. Last night after he had said that he would come by they had talked until Brigid had come home. He had a dry sense of humor at times, but he had her laughing out loud at his jokes. She learned that he was heavily into sports. He especially loved basketball, but his favorite thing to do was running in the rain.

  He was sitting near the middle of the reception area and was in her line of sight. He was at the table where Aunt Gretchen was seated, and several times she saw him chuckling. She was sure
that Aunt Gretchen was at her philosophical best and he was enjoying himself.

  "He is handsome," Hazel whispered to her. "I can see why you lost your head."

  "Yup," Brigid said from the other side of her, "and that's why she couldn't stop dreaming about him. He looks much better than the paintings, Caity, but then again looks don't mean a thing if he got away with murder."

  Caitlin was about to answer and then her eyes met his. She looked away swiftly.

  Hazel leaned even closer to her. "So I was reading up the case last night, if you could call the article a case, and it said that he stabbed her once in their kitchen after a passionate quarrel about her leaving him. The only reason he's not locked up is because the murder weapon was not found and his housekeeper said he was not in the room at the time of the murder and that it must have been an intruder.

  "There was no intruder, Caity, and there were no signs of forced entry. If you ask me, that was a flimsy excuse concocted by him and the housekeeper…The police didn't want to touch him because he is wealthy."

  "This is not right," Caitlin hissed. "It's Casey's day. Let's not talk about this now. Besides, remember that was just a journalist's opinion."

  Hazel shrugged. "Suit yourself, but remember Rita while you are making cow-eyes at him. Poor, sad Rita. He must have been a monster to her. Don't let his charming looks fool you, Caity. You have better sense than that, even though you think he is your dream guy."

  Caitlin sighed. Just a few short days ago, after reading the same article, she had thought the same thing. She had been fuming too when she had read the thing. So what had changed?

  For one, she had finally met Todd. Two, she realized that she was half in love with him already—primed by her dreams to be putty in his hand. Three, after hearing his side of the story about his marriage she suspected that he was honest and not sugar-coating his faults. She glanced at him now, a pleasant look on his face.

  He was not a murderer. He couldn't be.

  Hazel looked at her knowingly, as if reading her mind. She smirked, as if to say, He is.

  Patricia got up and gave a toast. She was smiling and her entire face lit up. As the matron-of-honor she was in an off-the-shoulder baby blue dress. Her hair was pulled back in a chignon.

  Caitlin rarely saw Patricia with her hair pulled back like that. With that hairstyle she resembled Helen. They had similar profiles: the same shaped chin, the same shaped eyes, even their way of moving was similar, even though Helen moved slower and more deliberately.

  It was uncanny how the Benedict family had a certain look.

  She looked across at Brigid to mention it and then thought better of it. There was no doubting that Hazel's son had a strong resemblance to the Benedicts. It would be stupid of her to broach that topic at this moment, since Hazel was still in quandary about her situation.

  She was snapped out of her rumination when Patricia started speaking.

  "A couple of years ago, I saw a picture of a girl in a file. She had golden eyes. I was prompted, by forces unseen, to choose her for Magnolia House and today my baby, Casey Givens, is married. It makes a person feel old."

  Everybody chuckled.

  "My toast, though, is not to the gorgeous bride but to the bridesmaids and I am the best person to do this toast because these girls are my girls, my daughters, the children I never had biologically but I have personally watched them grow up. Brigid, my fiery independent girl, who has a go-getter attitude and a thirst for success you wouldn't believe.

  "Caitlin, my calm on the surface but very creative and passionate do-gooder. For Caitlin, good is good and bad is bad, no middle ground.

  "And to Hazel, a sweetheart with a compassionate spirit and an over-developed spirit of empathy.

  "When they were younger, I must tell you that I liked going out with them and hearing people refer to them as mine. It made me proud then and it makes me proud now. I want you to lift your glasses with me as we cheer these gorgeous girls, the Magnolia Sisters, and er, the bridesmaids."

  Everyone lifted their glasses and Patricia came over and kissed and hugged each of them. Each of them hugged her back with all the love and affection that was pent up inside.

  "I got great pictures," Charles, the Lux photographer said to Caitlin as soon as the reception was over. "I'll process the pictures tonight. I am sure you will have a lot to choose from."

  "Yes. I will." Caitlin rubbed her temples. She had a tension headache. It was as if her body realized that all the build-up to the wedding was over and now she was falling apart.

  "You have a great family." Charles grinned at Caitlin. "I am almost envious of you. See you in the office tomorrow."

  "Thanks," Caitlin said. "Yes, see you tomorrow."

  She chuckled when he left. He thought that Casey and Luca's relatives were hers too?

  "What's so funny?" Todd tapped her on the shoulder.

  Casey spun around. "Hey, I thought you had eloped with Grand-Aunt Gretchen."

  Todd chuckled. "She did suggest that we needed to get to know each other better. Don't you think she's a bit old for me, though? Eighty-eight to my thirty-six. You don't think people will talk?"

  Caitlin doubled over laughing. Her headache had miraculously disappeared. She looked at him in his gray suit and his open-neck white shirt. He looked amazing; no wonder Gretchen wanted to talk with him some more.

  He pushed his hand into his pocket. "So, what are you doing after this?"

  Caitlin shook her head and looked around. Luca and Casey had already left. Nick and Brigid were dancing on the scanty dance floor. They were locked in their own romantic world. Hazel had already told her bye. She was heading to the airport with her husband and his nursing staff.

  "I have no idea," Caitlin said. "I think I am going to have to ask you for a lift home. We were chauffeured here from the hotel where we got ready."

  "Well," Todd smiled, "it will be my pleasure to take you home."

  "Wait!" Caitlin said, touching his arm. "I don't want to go home, not yet. It is just three o'clock in the afternoon."

  Todd nodded. "Okay, let’s go to my home. Maybe you can help me with the dinner that I am sure Deb cooked up."

  Caitlin chuckled. "I wasn't angling for an invite to your house."

  Todd looked at her contemplatively. "Come on, Caity. I would never think that."

  When they were on their way, though, she glanced across at him and wondered if maybe she had been angling for an invite. She would be dishonest if she couldn’t admit to herself that she had been wondering about where he lived.

  He turned toward Smoky Vale and they climbed the hill slowly while classical music played in the background.

  "I spoke to Patricia Benedict after the ceremony," Todd said after a while. "She is very proud of you guys."

  "Yes," Caitlin nodded, "she is." Then the thought occurred to her that Patricia would probably be curious as to how he was invited.

  "Did you tell her that I was the one that invited you?" Caitlin asked anxiously.

  Todd glanced at her and then looked back at the road. "Why, Caity, ashamed of me?"

  "No, not ashamed." Caitlin sighed. "Just don't want anybody else to caution me about you. And I don't want Patricia to worry unnecessarily. I am doing a job. I don't know why everybody thinks it's something more."

  Todd looked at her lazily and then looked back at the road. "My lady doth protest too much. Anyway, it’s not a bad thing having people caution you. At least you have people who care about you. And yes, Patricia knows you invited me. Who knows if she will caution you about me? Her husband Simeon and I are business acquaintances."

  "This society is so small." Caitlin harrumphed.

  Todd turned into a winding driveway and stopped in front of what was admittedly a spectacular-looking house with a view of the city spread out beyond it.

  "Wow," Caitlin said, getting out of the vehicle after he came around and opened her door.

  "I am glad you approve," Todd said smoothly. "My home is your h
ome; you can come and visit anytime."

  "It's nice up here," Caitlin said. "I love it!"

  "It's relatively new. I bought it six years ago."

  "After Rita's death." Caitlin swung around and looked at him.

  "Yes. I couldn't live in our other house any longer; too many bad memories and all of that." Todd tucked her hand into his. "Come on, let me show you around."

  *****

  The inside was just as impressive as the outside. Caitlin looked around, following Todd as he pointed out various points of interest in the house. His tour ended on the back patio where Deb, his housekeeper was.

  Caitlin didn't know what she had expected of Deb. Maybe when she heard housekeeper she had been thinking a chubby lady with a floral bandana and an apron around her waist, wearing sensible shoes and looking utilitarian.

  Instead she was almost knocked for six when she saw that Deb was a slim, sleek woman who looked anything but nondescript. She was dressed in a colorful maxi dress with lots of reds and greens. She had on bright red lipstick to match her colorful attire. Her hair was a mass of curly sister locks which were flirting with her waist and pulled away from her face in a matching red headband.

  When Todd introduced them Caitlin was immediately met with a hostile glance that was quickly concealed with a fake smile that Todd seemed completely oblivious to.

  "Would you like something to eat now, Todd?" She glanced at Caitlin. "Along with your… er... guest?"

  "Do you want something to eat now, Caity?" Todd asked, indicating that she should sit in the lounge chair beside him.

  "Not right now, thanks," Caitlin said apologetically. She didn't know why she should feel apologetic. Maybe because Deb was looking at her with a hostile air.

  "Okay then," Deb said testily, a pout to her mouth. "I will be in the kitchen if you change your mind."