The Chesapeake Diaries Series 7-Book Bundle: Coming HOme, Home Again, Almost Home, Hometown Girl, Home for the Summer, The Long Way Home, At the River's Edge

by Stewart, Mariah

  Chapter 11

  If Berry had heard the conversation, she gave no sign. Except, Dallas thought, there might have been just the tiniest bit of subtle satisfaction in her smile when she called them to the table. But all in all, dinner had gone as well as it could have. Cody was so clearly smitten with Paige, he copied everything she did, from the way she held her fork to the way she used her napkin. It was the first time Dallas had seen her son mimic an older child’s actions. At least he’d found someone with good manners to emulate, she mused.

  Dinner had barely begun when they made the discovery that Fleur was evidently accustomed to being fed from the table, as she begged unmercifully. Berry and Dallas agreed that she’d have to be broken of that, and forbade Cody to slip the little scamp so much as a taste of fish. Ally, on the other hand, continued to exhibit impeccable manners—much to Berry’s delight—by curling up next to Berry’s chair and remaining there throughout dinner. No begging, no whining. No bad behavior.

  “I can’t say it often enough, Grant,” Berry told him when he and Paige were leaving. “I couldn’t be happier with Ally.”

  “I’m glad it worked out for everyone and that you’re happy,” he replied.

  “Outrageously so,” she assured him.

  “Me, too,” Cody told him. “I love Fleur.”

  Berry glanced down at the white dog, then looked a little closer.

  “What is that around her neck?”

  “That’s the new collar we bought her today,” Cody explained. “Paige is taking the black one back to the shelter and the leash, too, so she can use it for another dog.” He knelt down and snapped the new leash on Fleur. “See? She likes it.”

  “Yes, well, not everyone can wear that shade,” Berry murmured. “It’s rather … well, striking.”

  “And see? We got purple for Ally, ’cause purple is your favorite color.” He shook the contents of the bag onto the floor and proudly held up Ally’s new purple accessories.

  “Lovely,” Berry told him. “It’s actually more of a shrieking violet, though, wouldn’t you say?”

  “I thought the expression was shrinking violet.” Dallas picked up the new leash and collar and handed them to Berry.

  Berry held up the leash. “Shriek or shrink?”

  “I see your point.” Dallas nodded.

  Grant laughed and put his arm around his daughter. “Thanks again for a great dinner, Miss B. We had a great time, didn’t we, Paige.”

  “It was fun.” Paige leaned over and tapped Cody on the tip of his nose. “Next time you get the croquet set out and I’ll teach you how to play.”

  “Okay.” Cody was content with the promise.

  “I’ll get back to you about the fence,” Grant said over his shoulder as he and Paige walked to his Jeep that was parked next to Dallas’s rented car.

  “Thank you, dear.” Berry went onto the porch, Ally at her heels.

  “Dallas, I’ll be seeing you,” Grant called to her just before he got into the car.

  “Most likely.” She did her best to appear nonchalant, though she was anything but.

  “Well, that was lovely, don’t you think, dear?” Berry said after waving good-bye to the departing car and coming back into the house. “Grant is still … well, he’s Grant, what more can I say?” She laughed. “And his daughter is delightful.”

  “Paige is a very sweet girl, yes.” Berry had already made it obvious how she felt about Grant and Dallas wasn’t going to take the bait. “Dinner was very nice. Someday you’ll let me in on the secret of pulling together a meal like that in little more than an hour.”

  “Easy-peasey, as they say. You call your market and tell them what you want, and they have it ready for you when you pop in to pick it up.”

  “When did you call the market?”

  “While you and Grant were chatting after we left the barn. I went straight to the car, my cell phone in hand. Speed-dialed Jaime at the market, asked what kind of fish was fresh today and what salads he had already made up. His wife makes them all from scratch, you know.”

  “You amaze me.” Dallas shook her head.

  “It’s my idea of fast food. Now, where did Cody go? It’s time for us to take our dogs out for one last spin around the yard before we all turn in for the night. Would you like to join us?”

  “Thanks, but I want to make sure everything’s in from the back porch and get the dishes into the dishwasher.”

  “I appreciate that. I am a bit tired,” Berry admitted. “It’s been a big day, hasn’t it, Ally. Now, let’s go find Cody and Fleur and take a little walk together.”

  Dallas finished loading the dishwasher and turned it on just as Berry and Cody came into the house with their new best friends.

  “Mom, I don’t think Fleur wants to sleep downstairs on her dog bed,” Cody told Dallas.

  “Where do you think she wants to sleep?”

  “I think she wants to sleep in my room,” he said earnestly.

  “I think you might be right. Take the dog bed upstairs and put it next to your bed.”

  He ran from the room, the little dog at his side, pausing to pick up the dog’s bed from the hall where he’d left it.

  “He is one happy little boy tonight,” Berry observed.

  “He told me he was happier than he’s ever been anywhere. Including Disney World.”

  “My, that is happy.” Berry smiled. “Thank you for telling me. That warms my heart. I want nothing more at this stage of my life than for the people I love the most to be happy.” She frowned. “Which reminds me. Have you spoken with your brother this week?”

  “No. I called him and left a message but he hasn’t called back.”

  “So did I. I wonder what he’s up to these days.”

  “We’ll track him down, don’t you worry.” Dallas kissed Berry on the cheek. “You and Ally go on up to bed. I think I’d like to work for a little bit. I’ll close up when I’m finished.”

  “All right. I’ll see you in the morning.” Berry bent over and unhooked Ally’s leash. “Come along, pup, and I’ll show you to our room.”

  Dallas had just finished in the kitchen, locked the back door, and turned off the lights, when her phone rang.

  “Hey, Norma,” she said after a glance at caller ID. “What’s up?”

  “What’s up is your divorce. I called Emilio’s attorney last night and offered him the deal we discussed. I told him that I’d heavily lobbied against it but that it was your idea and you insisted, and that there was a twenty-four-hour window before the offer went away forever.” Norma paused, and Dallas knew she was sneaking a drag from a cigarette that she’d supposedly given up last month. “Because if his client is too stupid to see a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make a killing in real estate, then he didn’t deserve it. Ted—that’s Emilio’s lawyer—couldn’t hang up fast enough. Long story short, he flew to Arizona and talked to Emilio, who apparently isn’t as dumb as I thought he was—at least where real estate is concerned. Ted called me from the rehab center and told me to draw up the papers, which I’m doing now. I’ll get them to him by messenger in the morning, and I told him I wanted them signed and back in my hands by four tomorrow afternoon because I already told the judge that we were not asking for a continuance of the upcoming hearing.”

  “What happens then?”

  “Then I make my case to the court to have the divorce finalized, Ted agrees on the record to all the terms including the child custody arrangement that you wanted.” Another covert drag on the cigarette. Dallas was tempted to tell Norma that she wasn’t fooling anyone but decided to let it go. “Knowing this judge and given the package we’re bringing is nice and neat, I think it’s almost a done deal. The property division was the only obstacle, and you removed that with one swift blow.”

  “And that’s it? We’re divorced?”

  “I left out a few steps for the sake of brevity, but yes. You’ll be footloose and fancy-free.” Norma chuckled. “Oh, to be single and gorgeous in Hollywoo
d.”

  “You are single and gorgeous in Hollywood,” Dallas reminded her.

  “But ‘lawyer’ just doesn’t have the same cachet as ‘famous Hollywood superstar.’ ”

  “You do just fine.” Dallas smiled. Norma did better than fine. “This is fabulous news. I can’t thank you enough for pushing this for me.”

  “It’s why you pay me the big bucks, girl.”

  “You earn it.” Dallas could hardly belive that this ordeal was actually going to come to an end. Other than Cody’s visitation with his father, Dallas’s dealings with Emilio were going to be limited. “By the way, were you able to get in touch with Victoria Seymour or her agent?”

  “Did we not only discuss that project last night?”

  “Yes, but did you call—”

  “Yes, I called her literary agent, whom she thanked in the acknowledgments, so it was easy to track her down. The agent is on vacation until next week.”

  “Did you ask for a number where she can be reached?”

  “I asked that she call me as soon as she receives my message, that it’s a matter of great importance to her and to her client. She’ll call me back or I’ll track her down next week. Not to worry. I’m on it, Dallas.” Norma paused. “I don’t remember you ever being this impatient over anything. Not even your divorce.”

  “I’m just really excited about the possibilities.” Dallas realized she’d been biting a nail, something she hadn’t done since she was a child.

  “I can see that you are. I started reading it again last night, and completely see the movie in this novel. But I do think you’d make a perfect Charlotte.”

  “I’m not thinking about starring in it. I’d like to try my hand at directing. I can just see this story unfold on-screen and I want to be the one to do it.”

  “I will do my best to see that that happens.”

  “I know you will, Norma. Thanks.”

  “Don’t thank me yet. Wait till we get the rights.”

  “I have faith in you.”

  Dallas hung up and realized she was still standing in the darkened kitchen. She closed up the rest of the house, then went upstairs to tuck Cody in. She found him already in bed, under the covers, his head on the pillow—next to Fleur’s.

  “Sweetie, I don’t know that you want her to sleep on your pillow with you.”

  He nodded vigorously. “I do. And she wants to. See? She’s smiling.”

  “I think she might get too warm under the blanket. She is wearing a fur coat, you know.”

  Cody shook his head. “She’s not too warm. She’s just right. I just want to hug her for a while. She’s my dog. My very own dog.”

  “Well, that she is.” Dallas sat on the side of the bed and patted the dog’s head. “We’ll compromise. She can stay there for tonight, because Paige gave her a bath today and she’s all nice and clean, but maybe tomorrow night she should try her dog bed.”

  “If she wants to.” Cody snuggled the dog that was clearly eating up the attention.

  “How ’bout a story?” Dallas asked.

  “The one about Clifford.” Cody yawned.

  “Clifford?”

  “The Big Red Dog. I got to take it out of the library. They let me have my own library card cause I’m gonna be here all summer.” His eyes were all but closed. “It’s yellow and it says ‘Cody Blair’ on it.”

  Dallas looked on the corner of the dresser where a stack of books sat. She found the requested title, but by the time she walked back to the bed, Cody was asleep.

  “Big day, indeed,” she whispered. “For both of you, I suspect.” Fleur’s eyes were open and she watched Dallas approach the bed. “That’s right, girl. You keep an eye on him. It’s going to be your job from now on.”

  Dallas kissed her son and turned out the light. She left the door partly open in case the dog wanted to roam during the night. She quietly went back downstairs to the library where she sat for a few minutes in her great-grandfather’s leather chair and rested her feet on the matching ottoman. The chair’s arms were worn in places, maybe those spots where he’d rested his elbows. She imagined him sitting there, his pipe resting in the green glass ashtray that still sat on the square table on the right side. A floor lamp with a silk shade stood behind and to the left of the chair, and she could easily see where a man—or a woman—might relax here at the end of the day with a good book. She’d never met her grandfather, but she’d seen photographs of him, and of course, his portrait hung in the front hall.

  She studied the row of bookshelves that ran along the one wall, and got up to take a closer look. On one shelf, several leather-bound albums were stacked and she brought them back to the chair. She was feeling nostalgic and hoped to find some pictures of her father that she might not have seen before, but this particular album was all Berry. Berry in costume, publicity shots from the studio she worked for on that particular film. Berry on the arms of just about every major Hollywood heartthrob of her generation—and a few who came after, Dallas noticed with a smile. She turned page after page, noting, not for the first time, that Berry had been stunning in her youth.

  “And right through middle age,” she murmured aloud.

  She was almost to the end of the album when she came across a loose photo of Berry with a man Dallas didn’t recognize. He was tall and blond and extremely handsome, though he didn’t have that Hollywood look about him. In all the other pictures, Berry looked very glamorous, her escorts equally so. But in this one, she was dressed casually with not a jewel in sight, her hair loose and soft. This one wasn’t taken at a high-powered event or party. She held the photo under the light. Was the background familiar? And the look on Berry’s face—just slightly dreamy—as she looked into the eyes of the man wasn’t something Dallas had seen ever before. She held on to the photo while she replaced the album on the shelf. Leaving the picture on the desk, she made a mental note to ask Berry about the man tomorrow.

  She turned on her laptop and tried to work on the notes she’d started to make on the next scene of Pretty Maids and hoped that she wasn’t jinxing herself by being premature in writing the screenplay, but she couldn’t help herself. The story had wound its way into her head and she knew she wasn’t going to be satisfied until she had finished, and she had a long way to go. But she hadn’t worked for more than ten minutes before she realized she wasn’t going to accomplish much that night.

  Instead of the characters’ words, it was Grant’s that kept coming back to her.

  The truth is that what was between us back then was very special. Some things just become a part of you, and no matter what you say, or what you do, they’re always going to be there.

  Of course, Grant was right. That whole time with him, that part of her life, had been special. It had been a time of exploration and innocence, of learning the rules of love and learning to respect them, of offering her heart for the first time and having it taken and cherished. Grant had been the perfect first love, because he’d loved her wholeheartedly in return. She’d never looked back on that time in her life with regret because there’d been nothing to be sorry about. At least until today, when she realized how much pain she’d caused him when the relationship came to an end. She’d never thought of it as her having dumped him, but clearly, he did. She didn’t know how, all these years later, to apologize, how to make him understand that she’d seen the end as something mutual, as they both moved on to college, she to Rutgers, he to UNC.

  The following summers were hectic, a combination of work and summer theater and little time for dating or trips to the Eastern Shore. Even Berry had had a busy few years. She’d had to hire a middle-aged cousin to serve as house sitter while she flew back and forth between the coasts during a temporary resurgence of her career because Wade was too young to stay alone and too old for a babysitter. It had been unthinkable to Wade or Berry that he skip St. Dennis and stay in New Jersey those years. To find out now, all these years later, that Grant had believed that she’d simply abandoned him and ne
ver looked back caused her heart to hurt. Knowing that he’d harbored those feelings all these years only made it worse.

  Her concentration broken, Dallas checked the front door to make sure it was locked, then made her way upstairs.

  “I’m taking Cody to story hour, dear,” Berry announced after she’d opened the door and peered into the library, where Dallas was busy working on her laptop. “Don’t forget that Cody is bringing Logan home with him. I’ll give them lunch, but later I do have an appointment for a trim.” She raised a hand to the nape of her neck. “I’m feeling a bit shaggy right about now. Oh, and we’ve taken both dogs out, so they should be fine until we come back.”

  “Thanks for the heads-up. Oh, Berry, wait. Before you leave.” Dallas held up the photo of Berry and the tall, handsome blond man she’d found the night before. “Who is this?”

  Berry crossed the room and took a long look at the picture.

  “Where did you find this?” she asked softly.

  “It was loose in one of the albums I was looking at last night,” Dallas told her. “But who is that?”

  “Why, it’s me, dear.”

  “Really, Berry? I didn’t recognize you.” Dallas rolled her eyes. “I meant the man. Who is he?”

  “Just someone I used to know,” Berry replied blithely.

  “Someone you knew from Hollywood? ’Cause he doesn’t look Hollywood to me.”

  “No, dear. I mean, no, I didn’t know him from Hollywood, and yes, he doesn’t look Hollywood at all.” Berry smiled. “Must run. Cody’s in the car …”

  Dallas picked up the photo and studied it after Berry closed the door behind her. Clearly, the photo captured two people who were deeply in love. But who was he, and why was Berry being so evasive?

  Dallas stood the picture up against the small pile of Post-its and memo pads. One way or another, she was going to find out who Berry’s mystery man was.

  Chapter 12

  Dallas heard Berry and the boys come into the house, and had all intentions of going to the kitchen to say hello, but wanted to finish one last sentence. That one sentence became another, which led to yet another, and before she knew it, Berry was at the door.