Wife Wanted

by Christine Rimmer

  Rick tapped on the door as she was letting the water run. “Need some help in there?”

  “No, thank you.”

  It took well over an hour, but when she emerged from the bathroom, every inch of her was fresh and clean.

  Just after they finished breakfast, Natalie’s intrepid aunt Rebecca arrived with Gabe Devereax, the private investigator the family had originally hired to look into the plane crash that had caused Grandma Kate’s death.

  They explained that they’d been over to the estate but Jake had still been in bed when they got there. Gabe, a rugged, powerfully built man with a take-charge air about him, said they were going to have to see about getting some decent security over there. The reporters were already swarming at the gates. It wouldn’t take them long to figure out how easy it would be to get in from lakeside.

  The red-haired Aunt Rebecca rolled her eyes. “Gabe’s big on security.”

  Gabe cast her a grim glance. “Your father won’t be happy when they start crawling in the windows, let me tell you.” He turned to Natalie, who was sitting in the easy chair, with her leg on the pillow-stacked ottoman. “I understand that you were there, at the estate, the night that Monica Malone was killed.”

  Natalie knew what was going on then. Gabe and Rebecca were “on the case,” trying to find out anything Natalie might know about the night of the murder.

  “Yes, I was there.”

  “Did you speak with Jake that night?”

  Natalie told them the same story she’d told the police.

  “And what else?” Gabe asked.

  Natalie met his probing gaze without wavering. “That’s everything.”

  Just then, the front doorbell rang. Rick went to answer it, and Gabe and Rebecca shared a pointed glance.

  “Are you sure you aren’t leaving anything out?” Gabe asked quickly, before whoever was at the door could interrupt them.

  “It’s all I know,” Natalie replied.

  Erica, with Rick right behind her, appeared from the central hall. “I’m here to fuss over my daughter,” she declared.

  After she hugged Natalie, Rick got her a cup of coffee and made sure she was comfortable in the other easy chair.

  Natalie tried not to be obvious about it as she watched the interplay between Rick and her mother. Rick had a way of putting people at ease. Her whole family had seemed to accept him without question right from the start, as if he’d always been one of them. And Erica, who was so aloof with most people, seemed to have chosen Rick as someone she could lean on, just the way she leaned on Natalie.

  Natalie found herself wondering again how she ever could have thought of him as being like the other men she’d known. He was at least as good at taking care of others as she herself was. And she was truly ashamed of how badly she’d misjudged him—and painfully aware of what a fool she’d been every step of the way with him.

  “Have you seen Toby?” Rick asked when he returned to the great room after seeing their visitors to the door.

  Natalie shook her head. “I think he wandered outside about half an hour ago.”

  It didn’t take Rick long to find his son.

  He made a circuit of the front yard and the backyard, then went out to the dock. He heard the small voice through the open window of the boathouse.

  “And everything is just fine here, even though it’s very, very wet and sometimes dark, deep down the way it is….”

  Rick peeked in and saw his son, near the Lady Kate, with what looked like a small stack of old letters beside him and one yellowed sheet of paper spread flat across his knees. Bernie sat a few feet away, listening with one ear cocked as Toby pretended to read what was written on the rumpled page.

  For a moment, Rick just stood there, watching and listening, as his son babbled away. He had known for a while now that Toby would be okay, but more proof still managed to tighten his throat and put a mist of tears in his eyes.

  He entered the boathouse, where the water lapped softly and the Lady Kate waited.

  “What have you got there, son?”

  Toby looked up from the page. “Letters from the friendly monster of the lake. Come look, Daddy.”

  Rick crouched beside his son and picked up one of the envelopes. It was addressed to Benjamin Fortune. The return address was in Sussex, England; the letter had been postmarked more than twenty years before.

  Rick glanced at the stack of similar envelopes that sat on the boathouse floor between him and his son. “Where did you get these, Toby?”

  Toby took his hand and pulled him over near a far wall, where he pointed at a loose floorboard. Rick bent and pried the thing up. Beneath the board was a metal-lined compartment.

  “You found them in here?”

  Toby nodded. “The friendly monster must of left them.”

  Rick grinned. “I don’t know if monsters write letters.”

  Toby stood firm. “Friendly monsters do.”

  Rick decided not to argue. “Maybe so. But I think Natalie would probably like to see them.”

  Toby shrugged. “Okay.”

  They scooped up the rest of the letters and took them all into the house.

  Natalie looked up, a relieved smile breaking across her face, when they entered the great room. “There you are. I was getting a little nervous, I have to tell you.” Then she frowned. “What is it?”

  Rick carried the letters to her chair and handed them over.

  By the time Natalie had finished reading them all, Toby had lost interest in the yellowed sheets from the friendly monster of Lake Travis. He and Bernie were out in the backyard, playing fetch.

  Natalie glanced up from the last letter and over at Rick, who was sitting on the sofa, a few feet away.

  He asked, “Well?”

  “Oh, Rick…” She hardly knew where to begin.

  “What?”

  “I… These letters are from someone named Celia Simpson, in England. They mention a daughter named Lana—my grandpa Ben’s daughter, by this Simpson woman. From what I can read between the lines here, Celia raised Lana as her husband George’s child. And it looks like Grandpa Ben wanted to know Lana—but Celia didn’t want him interfering in the life she’d made for herself with her husband. So she kept Grandpa Ben at bay.” She looked down at the letters again. “There’s also a mention of a granddaughter, Jessica, in the last of the letters, dated about fifteen years before my grandfather’s death. The granddaughter would be just a few years younger than me.”

  Rick stood from the couch. “Jessica, you said?”

  “Yes.”

  “Remember the woman who called two weeks ago?”

  Natalie did remember. “Jessica Holmes.”

  “And she called from England.”

  Natalie bit her lower lip. “It’s probably just a coincidence, don’t you think?”

  Rick didn’t seem to think so at all. “Did you happen to write her number down?”

  Natalie shook her head.

  Rick suggested carefully, “We could try London information.”

  After a moment, she nodded. “All right.”

  Rick went to the phone as Natalie busied herself putting the letters back in their envelopes and retying the twine that had held them together.

  Rick spoke to her from over by the phone. “Information shows a Jessica Holmes and a J. Holmes. Should I try them?”

  Ambivalent, but knowing he was right, she made a face at him. “Go for it.”

  Ten minutes later, they’d learned that J. Holmes was a man. And Jessica wasn’t home. She did have an answering machine, though. Rick left a brief message.

  “It’s the best we can do, for now,” he said, once he’d hung up. He looked at the stack of old letters, now tied up neatly in Natalie’s lap.

  “What will you do with them?”

  “I’ll turn them over to Sterling, next time I see him. He’ll have them checked out.” She set them on the table beside her.

  When she turned back to Rick, he was studying her. “Wh
y the long face?” he asked.

  “Oh, I don’t know….”

  “You do.” He sat on the end of the couch, near her chair. “Tell me.”

  She couldn’t help but open up to him. “It’s just, well, those letters mean that my grandpa Ben might have betrayed Grandma Kate.”

  “And you don’t like to think of him that way.”

  “No, I don’t. And it gets worse, because those letters bring to mind the ugly stories about Grandpa Ben and Monica Malone. Could there have been truth to them, too?”

  “Right now, there’s no way to know.”

  “Oh, Rick. To me, Grandpa Ben was a sweet man who took me fishing. Who listened to me. Who paid attention to me when there were so many more interesting kids in the family he could have spent his time with.”

  “He was good to you.”

  “Yes.”

  “And he wasn’t perfect.”

  “Apparently not.” She glanced over at the letters again. “I have this problem, Rick.”

  “Yeah?”

  “I used to look at the world through rose-colored glasses. Everyone said so. Lately, I’ve been trying to get real about things, you know?”

  He made a sound of understanding.

  “But I’ve kind of…botched that up, too.”

  “How?”

  “Well…”

  “How?”

  “With you. I judged you too harshly. I ruined everything between us.” She waited, half hoping he’d jump in and tell her that there was still hope for the two of them.

  But he didn’t. He only waited for her to go on.

  She bit her lip and told herself for the hundredth time to stop wishing for what was never going to be.

  Rick was still thinking of Grandpa Ben. “Do you believe your grandfather loved you?”

  “I have no doubt that he did.”

  “Then concentrate on that,” Rick advised her. “And accept the fact that he was human—and fallible. He made mistakes. We all do.”

  The day seemed to drag by. Natalie tried to reach her travel agent, to see if there was any way she could recoup some of the money she was going to lose by canceling her cruise at the last moment. But it was Sunday, and the travel agency was closed. She’d have to wait until tomorrow to see what could be done.

  As they had the day before, they left the television on, hoping to hear of some breakthrough in the mystery surrounding the death of Monica Malone. There was nothing new.

  But Tracey Ducet gave an interview that appeared on the noon news. She pursed her too-red mouth and blinked her false eyelashes and still managed to look like a wounded waif.

  “I hate to say it,” she told the reporter. “I truly do. But the whole world knows about the bad blood between Monica Malone and my family, the Fortunes.” Tracey sighed. “I suppose the police already have an idea of who did it. It’s a tragedy. It truly is….”

  Natalie grabbed the remote and turned it off. If she hadn’t, she might have thrown one of her crutches through the screen.

  “Come on,” Rick said after that. “Let’s blow this joint.”

  “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “Let’s get Toby and Bernie and some sandwiches and go out on the lake.

  Natalie opened her mouth to say no.

  Rick didn’t let her get the words out. “There’s a radio and a television right on the Lady Kate. And I’ll call your mother with the number of my cell phone, in case anyone just has to get in touch with you.”

  “But—”

  He was already headed for the pantry.

  Half an hour later, Natalie found herself sitting on deck, her leg propped in front of her, eating an impromptu lunch of crackers and cheese.

  It was a hot day, and the sun made bright jewels on the water. Natalie looked over the rail, remembering that first day when Rick and Toby had come to stay at Lake Travis. Only three weeks had passed since then.

  Yet Natalie felt as if she’d known Rick and his son her whole life.

  Soon enough, just as they had that other day, Toby and Bernie fell asleep on the deck.

  It was quiet. Natalie sat sideways on the padded bench with her bad leg stretched out in front of her. Idly, as she listened to the soft lapping of the waves against the boat, she toyed with the rosebud charm that hung around her neck. Rick emerged from the cabin, where he’d disappeared a few minutes before. He came and sat on the section of bench at her back.

  She put her hand on the rail and twisted her body around a little, so that she could see him. He was bending over the side.

  She smiled. “What are you looking for?”

  She knew his answer before he uttered it: “The friendly monster of Lake Travis.”

  She watched him from her awkward vantage point, her heart breaking as the full truth came to her: She was totally and completely in love with him. He’d lived in her house for less than a month—and she hadn’t the faintest idea how she’d survive when he and Toby returned to their real home.

  Yet she’d have to find a way. She would lose them, soon enough.

  “Look,” Rick said softly. “Can you see him?”

  Biting back the tears, Natalie played along, gripping the rail a little tighter and ignoring the twinge in her leg as she craned over the side.

  “Well?” he asked. “Do you see?”

  “I can’t…um…”

  “Sure you can.”

  She raised her eyes from the mossy depths below them. He was right there. Looking at her.

  “Oh, Rick…”

  She burst into tears.

  He reached for her. “Nat…”

  She batted him off.

  “Come here,” he said, so tenderly. And that time, when he reached out, she allowed him to pull her back, across his lap.

  He produced a handkerchief. She grabbed it, blew her nose and blotted up the tears. And then, at last, she simply lay there, in the one place she most wanted to be: Rick Dalton’s arms.

  “I messed up,” he said.

  “You messed up? No…”

  “Yes. Be quiet. Let me say this.”

  She gulped. “All right.”

  “I was way too hard on you, the other night. I knew that you’d been used one time too many. And I should have gone easy. But I didn’t. I wanted you. So I pushed things too far, too fast.”

  “No, really—”

  “Are you going to let me finish?”

  “All right. Yes. Okay.”

  “I could have been gentler, afterward, when you had all those doubts. But I have a few grim memories of my own, and they got the better of me.”

  “Your wife, you mean?”

  He nodded. “She…jumped to conclusions a lot. And there was no talking to her, once she’d made up her mind.”

  “Just like me.”

  He brushed the hair back from her face with a caressing hand. “Still, I could have been more patient. But I wasn’t. Last night, after you told me you were sorry about the things you’d said, I admitted to myself that I didn’t want it to be over between us.”

  Natalie stared at him, happiness welling up inside her.

  He wasn’t through. “I made a promise to myself that I was going to do it right this time.”

  “Oh, Rick—”

  “Wait.”

  She pressed her fingertips over her own lips. “All right. Sorry. Go on.”

  “I promised myself that I would take it more slowly, give you all the time you needed to see that I’m someone you can rely on to take care of you—every bit as much as I know that you’d always be there to take care of me.”

  She couldn’t keep quiet a second longer. “Rick, you’ve shown me. I see it. Believe me, I know the truth now.”

  “No, I’m still pushing too fast.”

  “No, really, you’re not. Not at all.”

  He shook his head. “I fell in love with you the first moment I saw you. From behind. With that lampshade on your head. And I can’t wait any longer.”

  Natalie grabbed h
is hand and pressed her lips into his palm. “May I say what I want to say now? Please?”

  He laughed. “All right. Go ahead.”

  She entwined her fingers with his. “It seems to me as if I’ve spent my whole life waiting for you to come along. I guess I kind of got tired of waiting. I started to…not believe anymore, that you would come. I settled in with Joel—settled for Joel is more like it. Do you know what I mean?”

  “I think so.”

  “And then, when things looked bleakest, there you were. But I’d already decided you weren’t coming, so I wouldn’t let myself believe you had arrived at last.”

  He tipped his head to the side. “You know, if you married me, your life would be so much simpler.”

  Natalie looked into his blue, blue eyes, feeling as shimmery and weightless as the sunbeams that danced on the waters of the lake. Even her fears for her father couldn’t dim the beauty of a moment like this one.

  She played along with his teasing. “How would my life be simpler, if I married you?”

  Rick squeezed her hand. “If you married me, we could go on a honeymoon without having to find a renter who’ll take care of the dog.”

  She felt for the rosebud talisman around her neck, realizing that Grandma Kate had known exactly what she was doing, after all. “You’re right.”

  He kissed the tip of her nose. “But you know us—we’ll figure out a way to take Bernie along.”

  “And Toby, too.”

  “Right. What would our lives be, without the kid and the dog?”

  “Not nearly so full as they’re going to be.”

  “So. Will you marry me?”

  There wasn’t a doubt in her mind. Anymore. “You know I will.”

  “I love you.”

  “And I love you.”

  “Can I kiss you?”

  “Please. Yes. Kiss me now.”

  Rick’s lips settled against hers. Natalie wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him back with all of her heart.

  Kate lowered her binoculars.

  Joy, sweet and fierce, was moving through her, giving her back some of the strength that so much recent treachery had leached away.

  Dear Natalie had found happiness at last. And Kate was satisfied.