by Lin Stepp
“Yeah, I think that would be great, Taylor.” His boy had turned out to be such a nice kid. How had that happened amid all the tragedy he’d experienced?
Carter turned at the door. “How would you like to take a hike over near the Cosby Campground this weekend? Go up to Hen Wallow Falls? Maybe cook hot dogs outside afterward at the campground?”
“That would be cool!” His sudden grin flashed in the dim light. “Maybe we could take Rhea. You could tell her I want her to go if you’re scared to ask her.”
Carter grinned. “Yeah, I might do that, Taylor.”
CHAPTER 11
After Rhea’s Sunday visit to Carter, she purposely avoided him for the next several days. She heard through Nana and others that he’d recovered. From the schoolhouse one day, she saw him drive by, laughing with his son, and on another occasion she secretly spied on him and Taylor as they swam in the lake. It was cowardly, but she needed breathing space.
At the office on Monday, she shamelessly googled the name Judith Benton Layman and studied every piece of information about her. She learned about the Benton family’s vast wealth and enterprises, Judith’s elite schooling, her studies in design, and the business she created and worked with until illness made her unable to work. She saw the names of the wealthy, privileged men Judith had dated and noticed that even after her marriage the press always included Judith’s maiden name in any coverage. To her surprise, there was seldom mention of Carter. Even after their marriage, society pictures of Judith only occasionally included Carter as her escort.
Of course, a lot of wealthy women still maintained a great deal of independence after marriage. She frowned as she expressed the thought. And Carter still attended school during the first years of their marriage and worked at Quest. He probably had little time for social events.
Researching Carter’s life, she learned about the development of his career, read about games he’d developed, and found online trailers of some of his latest games to view. However, neither his social life nor his marriage were highlighted often in the online articles and news clips she found. Mostly, as an afterthought, journalists would add: Carter Layman is married to the heiress Judith Benton, whose father, Morgan Adelman Benton, the current head of Benton Electronics, started Quest Corporation.
Previously Rhea had avoided learning anything about Carter’s life, now she felt she needed to be armed with all the facts she could find. She didn’t want any more shocking surprises. Dealing with Carter proved difficult enough without continually bumping into information from his past that shook her self-control and defenses.
Tired from bookkeeping and indoor office tasks, Rhea took her sack lunch out to the front porch of the ad-min building. She wanted to see the sunshine and breathe the summer air.
With surprise, she saw scaffolds set up against the church and a group of painters and laborers hard at work on repairs. Carrying her lunch with her, she walked over to see what was going on.
Grampa Layman came out the front door as she came across the drive. He waved at her before he turned to talk to one of the workmen.
“The front doors here are to be stripped and restained.” He gestured. “We want to try to keep the original color, too.”
“Yes, sir,” the man said. “We ought to get the first coat of paint on the exterior today and have the interior repainted and dry before Sunday service. We’re also scheduled to clean all the stained-glass windows, repair the broken one, and then let Mattie Brownlow carefully repaint the Scripture over the door when we’re done. She’s good with that restoration sort of stuff.”
When the man left, Grampa gestured to Rhea to sit down on the stone bench by the porch. “Sit and talk to me a spell while you eat your lunch, girl. I could use to sit and rest myself.”
Rhea sat down and dug into her lunch bag to pull out a second sandwich half. She offered it to Pastor Layman. “Here, want the other half? Nana always packs too much lunch for me.”
“Don’t mind if I do.” He took the sandwich eagerly. “I got tied up here with the workmen and haven’t made it home for lunch.”
“I’ll share.” Rhea smiled, spreading her food items out on her lunch sack between them.
She sniffed the air. “It’s great to smell fresh paint.”
“Yep, that it is. And it’s a blessed thing to see the old church getting such a face-lift.” He took a small sweet pickle out of a Ziploc bag and popped it into his mouth.
While munching the pickle, he gestured above them. “Mattie Brownlow, the historical expert hired to help with some of the restorations around here, has found us a bell steeple to put back on the top of the church.”
“Really?” Rhea opened a bag of chips to hide her astonishment.
“Yes, indeed. She researched old records and found a description and an old photo showing what the original steeple looked like. It got destroyed when a flat-line storm hit Cosby back in the 1930s. Storm took half the roof off, too.” He grinned widely. “I didn’t think I’d ever live to see the day we’d get a bell steeple back on the church.”
Rhea looked up toward the square-topped steeple, remembering how she and Carter once dreamed of finding a bell tower to replace the one pictured in ancient, grainy black-and-white photos of Laurel Springs. She frowned at the memory.
“What’s that frown for, girl? Isn’t it a blessed thing for the church to have herself fixed up like this?”
“Of course.” She offered Grampa a bright smile. She’d called Pastor Layman simply “Grampa” since she was only a small girl.
He studied her. “You’re troubling over the fact that it’s Carter’s money that’s doing all the fixing, aren’t you, girl?”
Rhea dug out a pickle for herself and avoided his eyes. “I’m happy the church is being repaired and restored. How could I not be? It’s the church I was raised in and I love it.”
“And?”
She gave up. “And, yes, it’s hard seeing all my old dreams being fulfilled by Carter’s money.”
Grampa dug into the bag of brownies now, ready for dessert. “I’m reminded in all this of how Joseph was sold down into Pharaoh’s land to become prince so he could help his people.”
Rhea snorted. “Carter was hardly sold into slavery in California, Grampa. It’s hard to see how those two stories relate.”
“Oh, I see similarities.” He munched a bite of brownie, thinking. “When Joseph’s brothers bewailed all they’d done, Joseph said: ‘Don’t be grieved … for perhaps God sent me before you to preserve you a posterity in the earth.’ God has a way of working things out for good, Rhea. And a lot of good is coming from Carter’s time in California.”
“Hmmmph.” Rhea fished another sweet pickle out of the bag.
A workman came to direct a quick question to Grampa before he continued, “Carter’s back in California. Did you know that, girl?”
Rhea dropped her pickle to the ground in surprise, and then bent over to retrieve it.
“Don’t eat that now; it’s soiled,” he told her unnecessarily.
He put a hand on her knee and patted it. “Your reaction told me something I was wondering on, Rhea Kaden Dean. You still have feelings for Carter.”
She started to deny it, but Grampa’s probing eyes forced her to say the truth instead. “I don’t want to have feelings for Carter, Grampa.”
He shook his head. “I’d hoped that message on unforgiveness on Sunday might help you to let go of old resentments and bitterness toward Carter. It’s not healthy to harbor feelings like that.”
She crossed her arms. “Listen, Grampa, I know Carter is your grandson and that makes this awkward, but even if you forgive, it isn’t all that easy to simply forget.” She set her jaw, trying to think what to say. “You loved Gram, your wife, Edith, a lot, didn’t you?”
“Still miss her every day.” He gave Rhea a misty smile filled with memories.
“Well, what if she’d gone off and married another man when the two of you were pledged … and then wandered bac
k here nine years later—widowed and with a son, how would you feel?”
She watched his eyebrows lift.
“You see?” She shook a finger at him. “It’s easy to tell someone else how to feel—but it’s harder to live it.”
“I see your point, girl.” He ate another of the brownies, thinking.
“Still, the past is the past, and the present is the present. I loved Edith Ann Costner. I still remember the day I first met her when we weren’t but fifteen. Prettiest little thing I ever saw. It’s hard for me to imagine loving anyone again like I loved Edith Ann.”
He tapped a finger on his chin. “I reckon it might have been hard for me to get past her choosing another instead of me. But if later on she got free, and if God hadn’t brought another partner to me in the meantime, I’d probably go after her all over again.”
Rhea sighed. “Here, Grampa, you finish up any of the rest of the lunch you want. I’ve got to go meet Jeannie to clean cabins.”
Fortunately, one of the workmen came to ask a question, giving Rhea a chance to slip away without getting into more conversation with Grampa Layman about Carter.
Rhea soon learned Carter’s visit to California would be brief. Billy Wade said he’d gone for a business trip in relation to the Traveler movie—now in early production stages. Taylor went along to see his grandfather. Rhea gnawed a fingernail thoughtfully and wondered how often Carter would be running back and forth between two worlds.
“It’s none of your business,” she told herself in the mirror Friday night as she got ready for her date with Marshall. “You’d be smart to focus your attentions on Marshall Sutton. He lives here in the valley; he’ll stay here in the valley. He’s safe and solid and sensible—just the sort of person you need in your life.”
Rhea twirled slowly to watch the black skirt fan out around her knees. With the black satin skirt, she wore a white silk blouse and a lavishly sequined black vest. She and Marshall were going to the symphony—and dressy black and white was always an appropriate choice.
Hearing Marshall’s car drive up, she put quick, finishing touches on her hair, pinned up for tonight, and grabbed the clutch purse she’d chosen. Marshall’s eyes lifted in appreciation as she came down the stairs.
“You look fantastic,” he said as he led her out to the car.
“Thanks. You look good, too.”
He did, dressed in a black suit, crisp white shirt, and neatly patterned tie. Rhea smiled at him, purposing to put away thoughts of Carter tonight and to have a good time.
They ate dinner at Chesapeake’s, an elegant, classic downtown restaurant in Knoxville. It had a quiet, tasteful atmosphere, and they talked of local happenings while attentive waitstaff made their meal even nicer.
“I liked your new column in the Newport paper.” Marshall lifted a wine glass to her in tribute. “You wrote about the history of the Carver Apple Orchard and I learned things I didn’t know about it.”
Rhea smiled with pleasure. “I enjoyed doing that piece. In fact, I’ve found writing my Now and Then column to be a genuine pleasure these last years.”
“It was a lucky day when the newspaper hired you.” He put butter and sour cream on his potato while he talked. “How did that happen?”
Rhea sprinkled bacon bits and chives on her own potato, thinking back. “I was a student at Walters State Community College. I took a journalism class as an elective and one of our projects was to write and submit an article or piece to a newspaper.”
She stopped to take a bite of her prime rib. “All I really knew very much about was local history, so I invented a column idea and wrote a short history about Laurel Springs for it. I sent it to the editor—not expecting much—and he decided to print it.” She shrugged. “People liked it and the editor asked if I’d write a few more. The rest is history, I guess. I’ve been writing a weekly column for the paper ever since.”
“Don’t diminish it, Rhea. You do excellent work.” He smiled at her again, and Rhea decided this was becoming a very nice evening. It felt good to be appreciated for her writing, and Marshall was making a distinct effort to make this evening special.
Knowing he would warm to the subject, she asked him how he was enjoying the new boat he bought. He entertained her then with lake stories, especially with an amusing one of teaching his nephew to water ski.
“I’d probably fall flat on my face, too.” Rhea laughed.
His eyes met hers with warmth. “You know, I’d enjoy teaching my own children to ski one day. My mother says it’s past time I married.”
Rhea dropped her eyes. “You’re only twenty-six, Marshall.”
He laughed. “You’re twenty-six and have a birthday in September. I turned twenty-seven in January.”
“Oh, I didn’t know.” Rhea felt sorry she hadn’t acknowledged Marshall’s special day in some way.
He shook his head indulgently. “Don’t feel bad for not knowing. We’d just started dating then, Rhea. But maybe for your birthday we can do something special.” He paused. “Like having a party to celebrate our engagement.”
Rhea’s breath caught in her throat, and she put a hand to her heart.
Marshall cocked his head to one side. “Have I surprised you, Rhea? I thought you’d know how I feel about you by now. That it would be inevitable where my thoughts might be traveling.”
She searched for some words in response but didn’t know what to say.
Marshall took one of her hands and patted it. “I find you very beautiful, Rhea, and very desirable. I think you and I would suit well in marriage. I hope you will think about it. Obviously, I’ve surprised you too much with my proposal for you to give me an answer now.”
Rhea worked a smile onto her face. What should she say? “It’s a lovely offer,” she said at last.
Marshall grew more possessive as the evening wore on. He found more ways to touch her than before—settling her into the car, walking into the theatre where the symphony performed. In the dark of the theatre, he found her hand and held it.
The orchestra performed Gershwin favorites that night. Rhea admittedly loved it. A guest pianist added sparkle, and many of the tunes, like selections from Porgy and Bess, were toe tapping. Other old favorites, like “I’ve Got a Crush on You,” brought a smile, and the finale of Rhapsody in Blue drew the audience eagerly to their feet.
She and Marshall talked about the performance with pleasure all the way home. He had bought season tickets to the symphony as soon as he learned Rhea loved to go. She sighed inwardly as they pulled up in the driveway. Why couldn’t she fall in love with Marshall Sutton? Or was love really necessary for a good marriage?
In the darkness of the car, Marshall pulled her toward him for a good-night kiss. Rhea tried to throw herself into it. But no sparkle occurred, no rush of warm feelings. No rising passion. Perhaps passion was overrated, too.
Rhea suddenly felt Marshall’s hand begin to fondle too close to her breast. She tried to pull away, but he held her in a tight grip, his other hand pressed firmly behind her back. She felt his breath grow hot on her neck and began to panic.
“I don’t want this, Marshall.” She brushed his hand off and tried again to pull away.
Angry eyes met hers. “How will you know if we’re compatible if you never let me near you, Rhea?” He gripped her arm and leaned in to kiss her with ferocity now.
Rhea kicked at him and pushed away more forcibly. When Marshall backed off in irritation, she opened her car door and made a sprint for the front porch.
As she looked frantically for her key, he came up behind her. “Don’t be angry with me.” His voice was soft now. “I didn’t mean to scare you. I just have strong feelings for you that are hard to control sometimes.”
He turned her around to face him, smiling at her now. “We had a nice evening, didn’t we?”
Wary, Rhea nodded, not wanting to say more.
“We’ll have more. And you think, Rhea, about what we talked about at the restaurant. I’d really like t
o buy an engagement ring for your birthday.” He patted her cheek fondly, like he would a child’s.
Rhea felt like smacking him. How dare he talk to her like she was the village idiot?
“Good-night, Marshall,” she said, struggling to offer him a polite smile before she let herself in the door.
Rhea tiptoed up the stairs, slipped into her room, and leaned back against her bedroom door with a deep sigh. What a night!
“Have a good time?” a voice asked, startling her.
Her eyes widened to see Carter sprawled in the window seat, his feet propped up on her bed.
With resignation, she walked over to drop her purse on the dresser.
“Yes, as a matter of fact, I did.”
He raised an eyebrow and smirked, and Rhea wondered if he’d watched them in the driveway from the window.
“You look very beautiful.” His voice softened now, and Rhea turned to see him eyeing her with appreciation.
She felt her heartbeat quicken. “Don’t start with me, Carter.”
He smiled. “How was Gershwin?”
Her mouth popped open in surprise. “How did you know we heard Gershwin?”
He crossed one of his long legs over the other. Carter wore shorts, and Rhea could see the dark hairs on his legs that tickled her legs when he drew her close.
“It’s easy to check the Internet to see the symphony schedule. And I heard Marshall say that’s where you were going tonight.”
His white teeth flashed in the light from the bedside lamp. “You’ve always liked Gershwin. Me too.” He started humming softly and then began singing stanzas of “Embraceable You”—one of her favorites.
Before she could collect herself, Carter got up and began to whirl her around in a waltz, still singing an improvisation of the lyrics.
Rhea stopped dancing and pulled away with reluctance. “You look like a gypsy, like the words in the song, with that dark hair.”
He snatched a silk rose out of a vase on her dresser and put it in his teeth, continuing to dance around.