Secrets Unveiled

by Mary Manners

  Grant sighed as he raked a hand through his hair and offered Maggie a weary grin. “How do you manage this pace—the plethora of kids’ personalities and quirks, the demands and incessant questions they seem to have a never-ending supply of—day in and day out without losing your mind?”

  “Hmm…” Maggie’s lips curved into a wisp of a smile that might have rivaled Mona Lisa’s. “It’s a secret.”

  “Is that so?” Grant tapped his temple with an index finger. He’d take the solitude of his sprawling downtown office over this chaos any day of the week. At least the land contracts he wrestled with didn’t have legs to run away, and they certainly didn’t attempt to scale the barrier outside the tigers’ den, like Tommy Clevenger had done. They didn’t throw up in the dusty dirt, either. “Well, inquiring minds want to know.”

  “Those inquiring minds will just have to wait.” Maggie winked as she mimed locking her glossed lips and tossing the key over one shapely shoulder. If she felt as exhausted as he did, she hid it well beneath a touch of humor and a wisp of a smile. “Information concerning secrets such as that will cost you.”

  “Dinner?”

  Maggie paused, her gaze locking with his. Her hazel eyes shone more blue than gray this afternoon, and now they registered a hint of surprise at his suggestion. Had he stepped out of bounds by throwing the thought out there? He certainly didn’t want to make her feel uncomfortable but the idea of dinner, well…now that it was out there on the proverbial table it sounded awfully nice.

  “I was thinking more along the lines of a story at the circle-rug when we all get back to school.” The words came slowly, and she formed each syllable carefully. Her fingers played with the strap of the purse nestled over one shoulder. “Gemma says you’re quite the entertaining reader, and I have a few books waiting—all animal-related and tied into today’s activities. I pulled them off the shelf and set them there for this afternoon.”

  “Of course.” Grant was hardly surprised. Maggie was a planner. She’d organized community service projects during high school and spearheaded the student council activities, among other things. She always seemed to know where she was going…what lay ahead. They were so unlike each other back then, but even at sixteen and seventeen Grant sensed the power of opposite attraction.

  His cellphone vibrated in his shirt pocket, and he ignored the sensation. Today was the longest stretch he’d gone without dealing with voicemail or texts in…well, since he’d taken the helm of the investment corporation. “Reading a story to this group of mop-heads…what could be more adventurous? I’ll certainly give it my best shot. Maybe I’ll get called up to do audio books and the rest will be history.”

  “Do you need to answer that?” Maggie motioned toward the phone that peeked through the fabric of his shirt as the impatient caller made a second attempt.

  “No.” He pulled the phone from his pocket and without so much as glancing at the caller ID, powered it down. “It can wait.”

  “But I’ve kept you from work all day.”

  “As far as I can see, the world is still spinning.”

  “Even so…it’s a bit selfish of me to monopolize your time.” Maggie’s gaze skimmed his suit. “I’m sorry about your pants…and that dress shirt. Is it silk?”

  “Egyptian cotton. At least it was Egyptian cotton.” He slipped a hand into his slacks pocket and felt the tie he’d shoved inside while tromping with the group somewhere between Chimp Ridge and Meerkat Lookout. If he remembered correctly, the boy nicknamed JJ had to be peeled from the exhibit’s rail by Grant while Maggie stepped away to the bathroom with a group of female munchkins who needed to use the facilities without delay. “But now I’d file it under…soiled shreds.”

  “Oh my…and those beautiful shoes…” She grimaced as she lowered her gaze to his dirt-caked feet. “Leather?”

  “Yes.” Grant studied laces discolored by mud puddles and leather scuffed by shards of gravel. He was sure, judging by the soreness in his feet, that the soles now sported holes clear through to his socks. “They’ve seen better days.”

  “I suppose, considering the sacrifice you’ve endured, that I owe you big-time for saving the trip…and the day.”

  Grant laughed softly as he suddenly longed to run a hand through her silky waves of dark hair. She was still so put together, not at all flustered by the events of the day, while he felt as if he’d been dragged by a freight train. “We couldn’t let the kids down. Gemma would have never allowed me to forget that. Besides, it was kind of fun—in an odd and twisted sort of way—spending the day with you and a dozen wild cherubs. I suppose I should thank you.”

  “Thank me?” Maggie splayed a hand over her chest. Unlike him, she’d dressed zoo-appropriate that morning in a powder blue sweater that brought out the iridescent blue of her eyes. Her jeans tapered perfectly over long, lean legs to disappear beneath the cuff of sensible hiking boots that she’d somehow managed to keep laced and splatter-free throughout the trip. “Whatever would you thank me for?”

  “Gemma wanted me to come today, but I put her off because I’m in the middle of a merger at work, and I didn’t want to take the time…” He shifted in the seat, nestling Gemma, who had nodded off like most of the others as they neared the school, in his lap. “She told me as we were leaving the house this morning that she’d prayed for me to come. I suppose those prayers were answered…in a round-a-bout sort of way.”

  “Maybe to you it seems round-a-bout, but I really needed your help today so I suppose God had a plan the whole time.”

  “Perhaps He did.” Grant smoothed a hand through Gemma’s damp, tousled hair as a protective wave surged through him. He couldn’t imagine loving the child more if she were his own. Since his brother-in-law, Jason, became a casualty of war two years ago, Grant had stepped in and vowed to be a help to his sister, Cara, and to also act as the father that Gemma needed and deserved. It was the right thing to do—the only thing to do. “Sometimes I just get so caught up in the day-to-day grind.”

  “Don’t we all?”

  “Maybe we should call it even.” He slanted a look her way. “Let me take you to lunch…my way of saying thanks for showing me a good time.”

  “A good time?” She waggled her fingers at him as a tiny laugh flitted through the air. “Now you’re really stretching it. And besides, it’s way past lunch time.”

  “I’m serious, Maggie. I’d like to take you out…to share a meal. That is, if you don’t already have plans this weekend.” A breeze drifted through the lowered bus window, causing her hair to dance. Again, Grant felt that urge to sift his fingers through the silky strands. “How about Sunday after church?”

  “I thought I’d seen you there at Community Christian, tucked into a seat near the back. So, you go to church?”

  “Why do you seem so surprised?”

  “I’m sorry.” She shifted in the seat and Ty’s head lolled against her shoulder. Despite the kiss of a breeze, the bus felt stuffy and warm. “I don’t mean to be rude. It’s just…you have never seemed the type.”

  “And what type is that?”

  “I don’t know.” Maggie balled her hand and pressed the fist to her lips, grimacing. “My, but I’m making a mess of this. If you want to go to lunch Sunday, well…my social calendar is anemic at best. It’s safe to say I’m free. I’ll go with you.”

  “It’s not a death sentence, Maggie. Just barbecue and coleslaw…or whatever you’d like. We can have steaks—”

  “No, no…I’m sorry. I really butchered that—no pun intended. I want to go with you, truly.”

  “Perfect. I’ll pick you up in the morning, then, and we can go to the service together and then out to lunch, if that’s OK.”

  “Sure. If you promise to—”

  The bus jerked as the driver slammed on its brakes at an intersection, jarring Maggie in the seat and cutting off her response. Grant’s arm shot out to rescue her from falling into the aisle with Ty in tow. His palm settled over her shoulder.


  “Oh, wow…that was a little too much.” Maggie turned to scan the seats—and the children—behind them. “I don’t remember that traffic light changing quite so fast.”

  “Me, either.” Grant loosened his grasp. “Are you OK?”

  “Yes.” Maggie gave Ty a furtive look before her gaze shifted to Gemma and then once again swept the other seats filled with children. “These roads have sure seen better days. All the pot holes are becoming a hazard.”

  “I know. Wow…your purse…it’s dumped on the floor.” The contents scattered and rolled, disappearing beneath the seats.

  “Oh no…” Maggie leaned over the edge of the seat to scour the rubber-matted aisle. “Ty’s hand got tangled when we bounced and the strap must have broken. I should have held it more tightly. Gemma’s inhaler’s under that seat across the aisle…”

  “Stay put. Let me take a look.” Carefully, Grant lifted Gemma and settled her against the vinyl seat cushion. “It probably slipped back a few rows. I’ll find it.”

  As the bus went back into motion, Grant slid to his knees on the dirt-littered floor. His pants were ruined, so what did one more stain—or unsightly rip—matter? He splayed his palms and searched blindly until, finally, his fingers connected with the cool metal of the inhaler case near the rear exit door.

  “I’ve got it.” He lifted the medicine for Maggie to see. “And there’s something else. It’s a wallet.”

  “Let me see.” Maggie reached for the item in his hand. “No, that’s a photo album. We’re planning to have Family Share Day at school—and Gemma asked me to bring some pictures of my family. I stuck that in my purse so I wouldn’t forget.”

  “I see.” Grant brushed off the cover where mud had splattered and then flipped through the pages. “Wow, this is you from…high school?”

  “No fair peeking. Let me have that.”

  Maggie attempted to snatch the album from his grasp but Grant pulled back.

  “It’s personal.”

  “Personal? You plan to share it with a bunch of kindergartners.” Grant kept the album just out of her reach as he grinned. “How personal can that be?”

  “That’s different. They don’t understand high school gawkiness and bad hair days like we do.”

  “There’s nothing gawky about this photo…no bad hair that I can see. Nope, just beautiful…” Indeed, Maggie’s hair had always been a silky black, shimmering as sunlight danced over it. During high school, the locks had skimmed her slim waist. She wore them a bit shorter now, but not much. Blunt bangs framed those alluring eyes. “Let me wipe the pages for you.”

  “I can do it.”

  “Allow me, please. You’ll soil your sweater.”

  “Oh…OK, then.”

  Grant used the tail of his shirt to brush smudges of dirt from the album binding and then, with a slight nod of agreement from Maggie, he continued to flip leisurely through the pages. As he went, he cleared dirt from the plastic folds. One by one, he admired the photos.

  When he turned to last page, the last photo, his breath hitched and his pulse hammered against his parched throat.

  Dark eyes stared back at him from beneath a mane of coiled, snowy-white hair. But it wasn’t the eyes—or the lips curved into a smile that seemed to mirror Maggie’s—that caught his attention.

  It was the silver heart resting along the elderly woman’s collarbone, the delicately engraved metal a shimmer in the summer sunlight that streamed through the limbs of the massive oak where she stood. Grant knew that locket; he’d seen it before. And he’d seen the woman in the picture, as well, staring back at him from the right-hand side of the opened heart Gemma had pulled from the pocket of his ripped pair of jeans last night.

  And Grant remembered her from years ago…as they sat together in the judge’s chambers the summer he’d turned seventeen, while he plea-bargained for a lesser-sentence of community service instead of a stretch of weeks in the juvenile detention facility.

  “Maggie.” Grant lifted his gaze to meet hers. He swallowed hard before continuing, “Who is this woman?”

  “That’s my maternal grandmother, Nell. She passed away the year after I began teaching. Why?”

  “And this necklace she’s wearing…this locket?”

  “How do you know it’s a locket?” She leaned in to peer over his shoulder, and the scent of her perfume drifted. “You can’t tell from the picture, can you?”

  Grant simply ignored the question.

  “You’re right,” she said, “it’s a locket. It has been in my family—was in my family—for the better part of a century before it was stolen. Grandma filed a police report, but it was never recovered. It belonged to my grandmother on my mother’s side and both my great-grandmother and great-great-grandmother before her. It would have been passed down to me next if it hadn’t been lost in the robbery.”

  Her voice faltered as her lower lip quivered and Grant’s heart plunged straight to his gut. The pain he’d inflicted was still evident after all these years. He felt the weight of it like cinder blocks piled atop his shoulders.

  “It was a memory…a piece of my ancestry that I’ll never be able to touch again. If I ever find out who took it, I’ll”—she shook her head as a pool of tears suddenly shimmered in her eyes—”well, even though Grandma would say I should, I’ll never forgive them.”

  ****

  Maggie tidied the quiet classroom and prepared the white board with the date and a few lines of notes for Monday. The weekend had arrived quickly and she was thankful to have a day or two to collect her thoughts and prepare lessons before diving into the next week. She said a quick prayer of thanks for Grant; he’d certainly stepped up when she’d needed his help today. And he’d made the bus ride back to the school enjoyable by entertaining her with his quick-witted humor and then by asking her out to dinner.

  She still couldn’t wrap her brain around the fact that she’d agreed to go with him to lunch following church services on Sunday. Just the thought of sharing a meal with him sent tiny trills of disbelief scurrying up her spine. Grant Anderson and…her? It seemed an implausible match. But she had to stop thinking of him as the dark-spirited, angry kid from high school and begin thinking of him as the well-grounded and thoroughly grown-up CEO of Anderson Investments. Whatever demons he’d carried through his past—and their time together roaming the halls of Central Valley High School—seemed to have been laid to rest.

  Maggie shrugged into her windbreaker and delved a hand into her purse to retrieve the small photo album she’d tucked there the day before for Family Share Day. Thanks to Grant’s kindness in fishing the booklet from beneath the bus seats, the photos she’d slipped carefully between plastic pages showed no sign of damage.

  Maggie settled into her rolling desk chair as she flipped toward the back of the album, to the snapshot of Grandma Nell. The sweet-natured matriarch must have been upwards of sixty-five when the photo was snapped at a Fourth of July picnic the year Maggie had turned seventeen. Grandma wore an apron to cover her dress as she carried a bowl of her famous German potato salad to a table covered in red plastic. Maggie remembered the day as if it had happened only moments ago. The locket Grandma treasured hung from a delicate silver chain to adorn her powdered collarbone.

  “It’s not worth much in terms of money,” she’d once told Maggie as she flipped open the embellished silver heart to show two pictures tucked inside—Grandma Nell and her mother, Great-grandma Colleen. “But the memories are priceless. This locket came from Germany with your Great- great-great-grandmother, and it has seen a lot of family over the years. One day soon it will be yours.”

  Except that one day had never come. Two weeks following the picnic, the locket was stolen from Grandma Nell’s home along with a slew of other valuables during a rash of robberies in town. By fall, an arrest was made and although every other item was eventually returned to its rightful owner, the locket was never recovered. Grandma Nell knew who the culprit was, but she refused time and again to share that in
formation with Maggie. All court proceedings were managed behind closed doors, and Maggie, despite her incessant pleas to Grandma Nell, was not allowed in attendance.

  Whenever Maggie inquired, Grandma Nell responded with the same string of words. “Some things are better left veiled. Everyone deserves a second chance, and sometimes even a third. Remember that, Maggie-dear.”

  Well, that might have served well as Grandma Nell’s philosophy, but as for Maggie…not so much. If she ever learned the identity of the thief, if their paths ever crossed, well she’d just…she’d just…

  Maggie nipped her lower lip between her teeth and bit back the sentence. What would Grandma Nell say if she could read such dark thoughts brewing in Maggie’s head? Oh, Maggie knew just what she’d say.

  “‘Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.’”

  Yes, Ephesians 4:31-32 was one of Grandma’s favorite Bible verses. Maggie sighed. This was just one of those situations where she and Grandma failed to see eye-to-eye. Surely, when the Bible said to forgive, it didn’t mean in cases where people robbed one blind, destroying family treasures, did it?

  Regardless, there was no point in fretting over it. The locket was gone for good, and with it, the only photo Maggie knew existed of Great-grandma Colleen.

  Maggie sniffled softly and placed the album on the desk alongside her attendance book as she swiped a tear from her cheek. She’d never see the photo or the locket again. Ever. It was gone for good.

  4

  “You have to tell her, Grant,” Cara prodded as she set a platter of scrambled eggs and crisp bacon in the center of the kitchen table. “Maggie has a right to know the truth about what happened.”

  “I know that, and I plan to tell her everything…but I have to give it some thought first.” He poured three glasses of orange juice. “I don’t know quite how to go about it, but I’ll manage to figure things out.”