The Will of Wisteria

by Denise Hildreth Jones

  Okay, Elizabeth thought, maybe she isn’t a bimbo. But she had to be a retired beauty queen, at least, because that certainly sounded like a canned pageant speech. She probably wanted world peace too.

  “That’s a very noble career,” Elizabeth replied. “Well, if you’ll excuse us.”

  Aaron took the hint. “Sure. It was wonderful to see you though.” He caught Elizabeth’s eye. “Both of you.”

  She gave a forced nod.

  “Maybe we’ll see each other again,” Bimbo Beauty Queen said.

  “That would be lovely.” Elizabeth went on into the restaurant, looking down at her black pants and making a mental note to go buy herself a nice dress.

  “That would be lovely?” Jeffrey mocked.

  The host pulled a chair out for Elizabeth and handed her a napkin. “What?”

  “I have never heard you use the word lovely.”

  “I say lovely.” She shook her napkin out for emphasis. “In fact, lovely is one of my favorite words.”

  He hid his face behind the menu, but she knew he was laughing. “I’ll have to remember that.”

  They both ordered seafood—Elizabeth the pan-seared scallops, and Jeffrey one of the house specialties, the peanut-crusted catfish. When you grow up in the Low Country, you acknowledge seafood as one of the main food groups. Their mother could do a Low Country boil better than anyone they knew, and Esau knew all her tricks. If they went to the plantation on any other day than Sunday, he might actually cook it for them.

  Jeffrey picked up his knife and slathered his cornbread with butter.

  “I never told you how truly sorry I was about Jacob,” Elizabeth said.

  “Thank you. I appreciate that.” He took a bite of the cornbread. “So why aren’t you two together?”

  “What two?”

  “You and Aaron. You know he’s crazy about you. Always has been.”

  “Why would you say that?”

  “Elizabeth Wilcott, you are one of the smartest women I know. How could you not know that Aaron was in love with you? You nailed Nate Bean with a single glance, but you couldn’t figure this out?”

  “It’s complicated.”

  He laid down the cornbread. “The rape?”

  She shrugged. “It just messed up everything.”

  “How are you doing? We haven’t talked about it since, well, since that day.”

  They both quieted as the waiter sat their meals down in front of them.

  “I’ve been going to a therapist.”

  “Is that helping?”

  She cut a scallop in two with her fork. “For a hundred and fifty dollars an hour, it better be helping something. Of course, since I’m making such big bucks at the Benefactor’s Group, I don’t really need to worry.”

  Jeffrey laughed. “Yeah, this hasn’t been the most financially lucrative year, has it? But you’re changing the subject.”

  “What was the subject?” She bit into a scallop and rolled her eyes.

  He took a bite of his collard greens. “How you’re doing.”

  “Well, you’re going to think this is crazy.”

  “After this year? I doubt it.”

  “Well, I have a friend.”

  “No!”

  She laughed. “Yes. I, Elizabeth Wilcott, actually have a friend. She’s rude, obnoxious, and just as stubborn as I am.”

  “The perfect pair. Who is it?”

  “Ainsley Parker.”

  “The girl you hated in law school?”

  “That’s the one. She’s my boss. But there’s something different about her. She’s had some really tough stuff in her life too, but she’s happy. She has a great marriage. She’s great at her job. People really respect her. And I don’t know, she’s just fun. It’s insane, I know.” She placed a slice of zucchini in her mouth.

  “It doesn’t sound insane to me. I think this entire experience has both of us doing things we should have been doing for a long time.”

  She reached down and wiped away a streak of condensation on her water glass. “You know, I never thanked you.”

  “Thanked me for what?”

  “For torching the barn. I never knew how healing that would be.”

  He reached across the table and took her hand. “If I had known, I would have done it years ago.”

  Just as they finished their dinner and left the restaurant, Elizabeth’s phone began to vibrate in her purse. “Hang on,” she said to Jeffrey. “Let me get this.”

  “Elizabeth, you’re going to love this,” the voice on the other end said. “I’ve finally gotten a break regarding the Executor you’ve been looking for. He actually—”

  Elizabeth looked at her brother, who was studying her expression intently. “Um, listen . . . listen. Wait a minute. I appreciate your work, but you know what?” Her gaze never left Jeffrey’s face. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”

  “What are you saying?” the befuddled response came from the other end.

  “Send me a bill for your services, but call off the dogs and destroy your records. We’re done. It simply doesn’t matter.” And she closed the phone.

  “Dare I ask?” Jeffrey said as they continued walking up the side-walk.

  She grinned at him. “Wrong number.”

  Jeffrey loved Charleston in May. Well, he loved it now anyway, because now he noticed things. The dogwoods and Bradford pears had already gone from white to green. He turned his head back toward the street to see Elizabeth climb in her car.

  That’s when the memory returned. A familiar scent.

  His mind scrambled to place it. In the doorway, with the blonde woman.

  Aaron’s cologne. And suddenly he remembered where he had smelled that scent before. The night of their abduction.

  His heart stopped. It couldn’t be. Surely all of this wasn’t Aaron’s doing. Not the way he loved Elizabeth.

  But if anyone had had their father’s ear, it was Aaron. His father loved him like a son—too much like a son, Jeffrey had often thought. More than he loved his own flesh and blood.

  It would make perfect sense. Aaron could easily have influenced his father to change the will. Maybe Aaron was the one who would get everything if they didn’t complete this year.

  Elizabeth passed him in her Jeep. She smiled and waved as she drove by. She was just starting to live. He could see it in her face. The lines had softened, the smile came more readily. She had a friend. She was beginning to heal. If she found out Aaron had done all of this, she would retreat back into her bitter shell and never come out again.

  Jeffrey had stood back and let her be abused once. He wouldn’t let it happen again.

  chapter thirty-eight

  Jeffrey sat inside his car in the parking lot in front of his father’s office building. He had been there for an hour, just to make sure he didn’t miss Aaron. He would have gone to his house last night, but he didn’t know where he lived. And he wasn’t about to call Elizabeth to find out.

  A dark green Land Rover pulled into the parking place next to Jeffrey. The moment he stepped out of the car, Jeffrey was on him immediately.

  He grabbed Aaron by the arm and flung him against the side of his truck, his face just inches away. “This was all your doing, wasn’t it? You masterminded all of this by manipulating our father!”

  For a moment Aaron stared at him, speechless. Then, in a flash, he jerked his arm free and pinned Jeffrey up against his own car. “You better explain what you’re talking about, and you better explain it quickly.”

  Jeffrey’s cheek was mashed against the roof of his own Mercedes. “You know what I’m talking about.” He struggled, trying to free himself, but Aaron pinned his arm more firmly behind his back.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about, but if you’ll act like a normal person instead of a crazy man, I’ll let you go and we can discuss this like two adults.”

  Jeffrey nodded. Aaron dropped his arm, and Jeffrey spun back around to face him. “I know what you’ve done!”

&nb
sp; Aaron straightened the collar of his suit coat. “What do you think I’ve done?”

  “My father’s will. This challenge. It was all your doing, wasn’t it? You manipulated my father so you could try to steal the inheritance from our family. You have played us, and you’ve used your fondness for Elizabeth to try to mask your deceit.”

  “You are not serious.” Aaron shook his head and turned his back on Jeffrey.

  “Don’t walk away from me.”

  “I’m not walking away,” Aaron said. He faced Jeffrey again. “I’m just trying to figure out why in the world you would think I had something to do with your father’s will. I didn’t even know anything had changed until Elizabeth called me the night after all of you had been kidnapped.”

  “Elizabeth called you?”

  “Yes, she called me as soon as she got back home, I guess. I went straight over. This is crazy, Jeffrey! Why would you think this was me?”

  “Your cologne. I recognized the cologne my kidnapper was wearing. I didn’t realize it until yesterday, at the restaurant, when I smelled it again.”

  “You’re accusing me because of cologne ?” Jeffrey frowned. Now that Aaron was saying it, it did sound absurd.

  “Where were you kidnapped from, Jeffrey?”

  “From my office parking garage. What does that have to do with anything?”

  “I was at home when Elizabeth called me. She called me on my home phone. How would I kidnap you and be able to be home when Elizabeth called me?”

  Jeffrey began to play the logistics out in his mind. “I don’t even know where you live.”

  “I live on Water Street. Could I have dropped you off and made it home in time to answer Elizabeth’s call?”

  Jeffrey really wasn’t sure. He wasn’t sure of anything. “I was dropped off at my office downtown. You could have had plenty of time. You—you could have had it all planned out with the other kidnappers.”

  “This is insane! You’re getting all of this from a cologne? And how many people wear this cologne, Jeffrey?”

  Jeffrey didn’t answer.

  Aaron shook his head. “Do you know how much I cared for your father? I was there. I helped Esau take care of him when none of his own children even called.”

  Jeffrey gave one last attempt. “All the more reason he would have listened to you.”

  “If he had listened to me, Jeffrey, he would have started being a father to Elizabeth and the rest of you much earlier.”

  That was when Jeffrey saw it. The look in Aaron’s eyes. A love like that, like the one he had for Elizabeth, could never harm her or take advantage of her. He dropped his head. “I’m sorry, Aaron. The whole idea was stupid.”

  Aaron felt his anger rising. “You’re right. It is stupid. I’ve served your father for over ten years. And I’ve loved your sister for about as long. But if this is what you think of me, then here are my keys.” He fumbled with his key chain.

  “No, Aaron, I don’t want your keys. Listen, I’m sorry. Really, I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking. It’s just Elizabeth, you know, she’s been the walking wounded for so long. And I just thought if you hurt her too, she might never recover.”

  Aaron gave a short, bitter laugh. “Your sister wouldn’t care what I did.”

  Jeffrey shook his head. “That’s where you’re wrong. She may not admit it, but she loves you. She just doesn’t know how to love. Promise me you’ll fight for her, Aaron. No one has ever really fought for her before.”

  “You can’t fight for someone who won’t let you love them.”

  “She’s coming around. I promise. Just try one more time. And again, I’m really sorry. This whole thing was stupid.” Jeffrey extended his hand. “Truce?”

  Aaron reciprocated. “Truce.”

  Aaron watched as Jeffrey drove away. He walked into the office and headed upstairs, his footsteps creaking heavily against the old wooden stairs. Once in his office, he sank into the chair and opened the bottom file drawer on his desk.

  In the back of the drawer lay a tiny box—an antique diamond ring that caught the morning light with its brilliant facets. His grandmother had given it to him, to place upon the finger of the woman who stole his heart.

  His heart had been stolen for a long time—kidnapped and held for ransom. He had just begun to get it back again. And now Jeffrey wanted him to open himself up again, to make himself vulnerable to Elizabeth’s apathy.

  He, too, was just beginning to heal. The wounds were barely closed, still raw and painful. He snapped the box shut and put it back into the file drawer.

  He couldn’t risk getting his heart torn out again.

  Not this time.

  The blue lights of the patrol car turned into the projects off of Rivers Avenue into a ghost town. At the first sign of the police, all the drunks and crackheads scurried for cover like cockroaches. Mary Catherine had called in a substitute for the day so she could make sure that not one of Charmaine’s possessions was mishandled. It was the last week of school so all the substitute had to do was control the bedlam anyway. And Mr. McClain had clearly understood.

  The first thing she had done when she got home with Charmaine was to call Child Protective Services. Charmaine begged her not to do it.

  “I have no choice, Charmaine,” Mary Catherine had explained.

  “As a teacher I am required by law to report this. Technically I shouldn’t have taken you out of there without official permission.” Fortunately the social worker had understood and agreed to allow Charmaine to remain in Mary Catherine’s custody temporarily instead of shuttling her off to a foster home.

  “I’m afraid they’ll arrest my mother.”

  “They’ll get help for your mother,” Mary Catherine assured her. “And they’re going to send a policeman with me to get the rest of your things tomorrow. We’ll store them in my garage for the time being.”

  The patrolman, when he showed up, turned out to be a boy she knew in college. “So you came here all by yourself last night?” he asked.

  “I’ve been called crazy recently.”

  “I can understand why. Most of Charleston’s finest don’t even want to come down here.”

  The movers she had hired for the morning had to be goosed an extra two hundred dollars, even with the police escort. But nothing was stirring in the projects; the place looked completely deserted. Even the drunk on the stairs had found another place to sleep it off.

  Charmaine’s mother and her friends had been taken into custody during a raid the previous night. Mary Catherine had already spoken with a friend who was a lawyer to help get her in a rehabilitation facility in Columbia, away from anything familiar.

  In less than an hour Charmaine’s bed, desk, books, and all her personal treasures had been boxed up, loaded into the small U-Haul truck, and taken to Mary Catherine’s. By the time she left to pick Charmaine up from school, the girl’s entire room had been re-created in Mary Catherine’s guest bedroom.

  Elizabeth pulled up to the front of Hazel’s house. Hazel was waiting on the front porch with her best blue Sunday dress on and her black patent leather purse strapped across her dainty wrist.

  “Are you not going to tell me where you’re taking me?”

  “Hazel, how many times in life do people actually get a real surprise?”

  “Well, I had five of them.”

  Elizabeth laughed. “Your children don’t count.” She closed the car door, and they drove in silence to the market area off King Street, pulling to a stop at the door of Tristan’s restaurant.

  “Ooh, this is a might fancy restaurant, Elizabeth.”

  “Well, you look so beautiful you deserve a mighty fancy restaurant.”

  Elizabeth led Hazel into the restaurant and through frosted glass doors into a private seating area. The room erupted with applause. All five of her children, along with some of the staff from the Benefactor’s Group, were seated around a large table.

  Ainsley slipped a file of papers into Elizabeth’s hands
and turned up her nose. “Are you wearing a dress?”

  “I wear dresses.” She glared at Ainsley and returned her attention to the moment. The crowd hushed. “Hazel Moses,” she said, “it is my great honor to present to you the official deed to your home.” She pulled the title from the file.

  Hazel’s hands flew to her mouth and tears welled up in her eyes. “Elizabeth! You can’t be telling this old woman the truth!”

  “I’m telling you the gospel truth,” Elizabeth retorted.

  Everyone laughed and chattered and hugged everybody else. The waiter came and took their orders and brought them all drinks. And at last the food arrived.

  “Now before we receive this fine meal, we need to thank our good Lord for all that he has done for us today,” Hazel said. All of her children clasped hands and bowed their heads instinctively. They had obviously done this before.

  Elizabeth cast her gaze in Ainsley’s direction, but her head was already bowed. Elizabeth followed suit. She felt Ainsley reach out and grasp her hand.

  “Dear Lord, we can’t thank you enough for what you’ve done for us today. You’ve parted waters as great as those that you parted for the children of Israel.”

  “Yes, you have, Lord,” came a response from across the table. Other affirmations followed: “Yes, Lord. Yes.”

  “And, Lord, I pray today for those family members that allowed us to have our home. I pray you bless them. And I pray for the men who tried to take it from us. May their business be blessed. And, Lord, for our home that you’ve given us, may it be used all the days of our lives to bring you glory. To feed the hungry, house the lonely, raise godly grandchildren, and pass on a heritage for the world to come.”

  “Oh, make it so, Lord, make it so.” Elizabeth cocked one eye open to see one of Hazel’s daughters talking to the ceiling.

  “And, Lord, about Elizabeth here—”

  Elizabeth heard the falter in Hazel’s voice. She clenched her eyes tighter.

  “Lord, I don’t know why you blessed me with such an angel to take on my case, but I don’t believe that any of this would have happened without her. I pray that somehow she would see how mightily and wisely she allowed herself to be used on my behalf.”