“We haven’t said where we’re going to be living.” Just like Sue, always thinking ahead.
“I like it out here.”
“I don’t want to have to do without you for long drives to work every day.”
“So we can live at my house.” And then he remembered something else. “I have a room I want you to help me dismantle.”
With a gentle kiss, and a look in her eyes he hadn’t dared believe he’d ever see, Sue said, “I’d be honored,” and pulled open her front door.
“Mom! Dad! I was going to call you.”
Openmouthed, Jenny gaped, saying absolutely nothing for once. Luke stared down the tall man in his daughter’s home, with an arm around her and a baby in his other arm.
“It’s about damn time.” He held out his hand.
With his own hand suddenly engulfed in a firm grip, Rick grinned and knew he’d just gained a dad. His first ever.
Which just went to show that if a man lived long enough, he could have everything.
IT WASN’T UNTIL MUCH later that night, after Sonia and Nancy had come back, joined in the festivities and left, that Sue’s parents told her the reason for their impromptu visit. The four of them had put the babies to bed and ordered pizza. Jenny had heard from Emily that Adam’s preliminary results looked good. And now they were sitting in the living room.
Jenny pulled an old familiar box out of her purse. Sue didn’t want to look at it. Didn’t want to see it anywhere but on Grandma’s dresser. She’d had enough for one day.
“I need you to keep this for me, sweetie, please,” her mom said, handing the box to Sue.
When she didn’t immediately reach for it, Rick did, holding it in both hands as he sat next to her on the couch. He was so close their thighs were touching, and for the first time in her life Sue had a glimpse of what it was going to be like to have someone share everything in life with her. And fully understood what perfect moments were all about.
She stared at the box.
“I’ve got that weak spot where your uncle Sam’s concerned,” her mother said.
“He just won’t let up on Jenny about the necklace. He calls her almost every day. Sends e-mails,” Luke added.
“Does he know you have it with you?”
“No,” Jenny said. “But he’s mentioned it several times. I’m afraid, if I keep it, I’m going to give in to him.”
“I think it’s a good idea for you to keep it, Sue,” Luke explained. “Sam won’t be able to get it from your mother, and he won’t know to come to you.”
“And even if he did, he’d never, ever get it from me,” Sue said. She was a strong woman. She could count on herself.
But she needed people, too.
“What does Sam want with this?” Rick asked, indicating the box.
“Probably to sell it,” Sue said. “It’s been in our family for generations. Losing it to my uncle’s avariciousness would be criminal. Horrible.”
“I think he wants it to solidify his right to it,” Jenny said. “Being the only child of Robert and Sarah, being ruler of the family, seems to be his driving force. I’ve just never been able to figure out why.”
Sue wished her mother would quit trying. And yet she took an odd comfort in the fact that she knew Jenny wouldn’t. Because that was who she was.
The woman who’d given Sue life. Who’d always been her champion. Her support. Whose greatest sin was in wanting Sue to always know that she was loved.
Thinking of Carrie asleep in her crib, Sue hoped that someday she could be half the mother Jenny Bookman was.
The four of them talked long into the night. About Adam and Joe. Sarah, Robert and Jo. About Daniel—Jo’s child with her second husband—so set apart. About Nancy. And Christy. And about Hannah. Sue cried as her husband-to-be told her parents about the daughter he’d lost.
And she loved her parents so much when they asked if they could visit the girl’s grave with them before they flew home the next day.
Trying to understand, they talked about Jo giving Jenny away. About Robert continuing his affair with Jo after Adam was born. About Rick’s mom unable to sign away her rights to her son so he could be adopted. And Christy, who’d ended her own life. They wondered, in the quiet safety of their small circle, if things might have been different, better, had one person done one thing differently.
And in the end, they could only find one answer. Love. Love brought understanding. It brought forgiveness. It held families together, brought them together. And as long as there was family, there would be love.
Rick slid the box on his lap between Sue’s hand and his, pushing it into her palm. “You haven’t looked at this.”
“I know.”
“Maybe you should.”
She stared at the box. Wanted to hide it in a bottom drawer and forget about it. Just as she’d tried to forget that bathroom floor so many years ago.
Sue opened the box. And stared at the marvelously intricate gold chain with the heart-shaped diamond surrounded by sapphires of the purest blue.
“That’s magnificent,” Rick said in a near whisper. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“It belongs in a museum,” Luke agreed. “Except that in this family, it’s not a jewel, or a piece of art. It’s the heart that holds us all together.”
Through a blur of tears, Sue continued to look at the heirloom that had been at her grandmother’s throat for every important family event she could remember. Graduations. Robert’s retirement. Luke’s retirement. Sue’s mom and dad’s going-away party when they moved to Florida.
Whatever else Grandma had done, whatever secrets she’d kept, she’d loved them all with her whole heart. She’d given them her whole life.
And Sarah Sue Carson was going to continue the legacy.
ISBN: 978-1-4268-3957-3
A DAUGHTER’S TRUST
Copyright © 2009 by Tara Taylor Quinn.
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A Daughter's Trust Page 19