by Ann Yost
“She’s planning to move to Chicago, you know.”
“Well, she can just change her plans. Or, she can leave the boy with me. It’s certainly my turn.”
Nick chuckled, humorlessly. “You might want to use a more conciliatory approach.”
“What about you? Are you still going to marry Daisy?”
“No.”
“I think you’re a fool.”
Nick’s eyes narrowed and his fists clenched.
“You love each other. She set Alice’s hair on fire to try to save your skin. So what if she believed her sister over you? It was natural.”
“I know. They’re sisters. Blood.”
Buzz frowned at him. “It was natural because she’s trusted her sister all her life. She’s known you what, seven days?”
Nick shrugged. “Blood’s blood.”
Buzz gazed at him for a long moment, then he cursed and jerked open his desk drawer. He pulled out the scrapbook Isabelle had given Nick.
“What’re you doing with that?”
“Aunt Isabelle suggested I get you to look at it.”
“Later. We’ve got a company to save.”
“This is more important.” He handed it over and, reluctantly, Nick began to flip through the pages. It was full of newspaper clippings, report cards and snapshots of birthday parties and dances, football games, and prep school and college awards, programs and tickets and ribbons that he and Buzz had won as youngsters. There was an entire section on his racing career.
A lump formed in Nick’s throat but he swallowed it. He looked over at his brother.
“So? What’s the big deal?”
“Don’t you get it? Theo treated us both the same. You were as much his grandson as I was. “
“Then why did he disinherit me?”
“I spent a long time puzzling over that,” Buzz admitted. “He knew, everybody knew that you’d make a better CEO for Bowman’s Biscuits but he sent you off and kept me around to screw up. I think he didn’t want you to take the job out of a sense of duty. I think he wanted you to have your own adventure, pursue your own dream but, at the same time, he wanted you to come back to Mayville.”
Nick stared at the photographs of himself as a child.
“That’s what Daisy said.”
“That’s probably why he devised the story of the Nazi loot. He knew that one day he’d have a powerful reason to summon you back. He knew you’d come. He knew you wouldn’t turn your back on the family and he was right.
Nick was silent.
“Theo didn’t play favorites with us, unless you count the fact that he had more confidence in you. It isn’t fair to judge Daisy by the same standard. She didn’t expect her sister to lie.”
“But she expected that from me.”
Buzz shook his head. “That wasn’t even about you. It was about her and Caroline.” He paused. “Junie says she just sits out there at the cabin staring at the lake. Don’t you think she’s suffered enough for doubting you? Don’t you think you’ve suffered enough?”
Nick leafed through the scrapbook for another minute as his brother’s words washed over him and the terrible sense of betrayal eased. The need to punish Daisy faded, banished by the much more compelling need to be with her, to take care of her, to love her. If he didn’t do something, quickly, he faced the rest of his life without her.
****
Three days later Nick drove out to the lake. He found Daisy on the porch in one of the Adirondack chairs facing the lake. Larry occupied the other. The cat protested, briefly, and then permitted Nick to take his seat.
“Hey,” he said.
“Hey, yourself.” She didn’t smile. Nick felt a sharp pang as he peered at her face. It was thinner and without its customary animation. Because of him?
“Got any kumquat juice?”
“Help yourself.”
He studied her for a moment. She was physically present and polite enough but she wasn’t really there. Would his words make a difference? He was suddenly unsure.
“You know, I keep thinking about how you’d have handled Caroline’s situation if you’d been in her shoes. Not quietly, that’s for sure. You’d have hunted the guy down with an air rifle.”
She glanced at him.
“Maybe. You never know how you’ll act in a situation until it happens.”
He picked up one of her hands. It was cold and unresponsive. He chafed it, absently.
“My expectations were unreasonable. You’d never had a reason to doubt your sister and you were convinced she’d told you the truth about Stevie. It wasn’t a great moment to try to think things out, either, what with Alice’s gun pointing at you. I want you to forgive me.”
“There’s nothing to forgive you for,” she said.
“Then forgive yourself. I don’t want you to think about this anymore. I want to get on with our lives. You agreed to marry me and I’m gonna hold you to it.”
She turned to him and the golden eyes gleamed with unshed tears.
“I’ll do it again.”
“What?”
“I’ll doubt your word. Don’t you see? Trust is everything. It is to me and I know it is to you. You trusted Theo—believed in him—for more than twenty years and then he sent you away. I said I’d marry you and then I let you down.”
Nick got down on his knees to get closer to her.
“It isn’t the same thing. And, anyway, I’ve decided you were right. Isabelle gave me a scrapbook that Pops put together. It’s clear he thought of me as his grandson. You were right about that.”
“I’m glad you’ve made your peace with Theo but I still can’t marry you.”
He lifted her cold hand to his mouth and pressed his lips against her knuckles.
“Why?”
She stared at her hand. “I thought it would be enough, trust and liking and, you know, the attraction.”
“And it isn’t?”
“No. Not for me. Happily ever after isn’t just a comforting concept to me. During the past few days when I had to face the fact that my sister lied to me and that I failed you, I realized that a marriage needs more than just trust. It needs love.”
He held her hand against his cheek.
“Our marriage will have love. You love me. I knew it that night in Chicago. Somehow I can’t see you going to bed with a guy you don’t love.” He watched the color seep into her cheeks. “And I love you, too, Daisy. I think I loved you from the moment I heard you trying to reason with Quentin about his codpiece. Let’s put the past week behind us. Let’s start a life together. Now.”
She looked at him, steadily.
“You never wanted to marry, Nick, you told me so yourself. What if you suddenly realize you don’t want to be tied down? That you miss your old footloose life? I think we should wait, think this over for awhile.”
He held her hands and peered into her eyes. He knew she wanted to believe.
“Wait right here,” he said, getting to his feet.
Her eyes widened. “You want the kumquat juice now?”
“Just wait here.”
****
She watched him jog to the Malibu and open the trunk. She couldn’t believe he was still driving the rental car. It felt as if he’d been back in Mayville for years. She couldn’t believe he’d said he loved her but the longed for words hadn’t jolted her into stratospheric bliss. She’d told him the truth about her reservations. They’d been together a week. He’d been on his own so much longer. He might have proposed for so many reasons. He probably felt he owed her marriage after their shared, unprotected intimacy. He might even believe he wanted to settle down and raise a family but would he feel the same way tomorrow? Next week? Next year?
Daisy wrapped her arms around her waist and shivered. She didn’t fully trust her own instincts anymore.
He returned a minute later carrying a large, cardboard box. As he lowered the sides of it she could see it was the dollhouse she’d found in the cellar, the miniature version of the G
ray Lady. Its fresh paint gleamed in the sunlight and she noticed the rooms were freshly painted and filled with tiny furniture—and people. There was even a Christmas tree in the parlor.
“It took hours for us to restore it,” Nick said, “but it was worth it.”
“Us?”
“Caroline and I worked on it every night this week. We sanded and painted and talked about you, about how important you are to each of us. We wanted you to have the miniature house.”
“Because you plan to raze the real one?”
“No. It’s partly to show our support for Happily Ever After.”
“And what’s the other part?”
His cheeks turned ruddy as if he were slightly embarrassed.
“It’s a symbol. I want a home with you. A life. A family. And I wanted you to know I can be a handy guy to have around the house.”
This time the happiness hit with full force. Daisy cried out and flung her arms around Nick’s neck. “You are a handy guy,” she said, her words muffled by his shirt, “a handy guy and an essential guy. I love you so much.”
His lips found hers before all the words were out of her mouth and neither of them spoke for a long, long time, not, in fact, until the Mendelssohn melody filled the air.
Daisy slipped the cell phone out of her pocket.
“Happily Ever After,” she said, breathlessly, “This is Daisy.”
“Elias Foote here. Over in Titusville? You know that rosewood casket you sent me?”
“Miss Ora’s coffin?”
“No, t’other one. Fer the one that ain’t dead yet.”
Miss Olive’s. “Of course.”
“My wife was vacuumin’ the inside and she couldn’t get the lining to lie flat in the cover. Seems someone put an envelope in there at some time.”
“An envelope?”
“Yeah, it’s got Mr. Theo Bowman’s name on it. Thought you might want to give it back to the family.”
A thrill of excitement worked its way up Daisy’s spine.
“Thank you, Mr. Foote. We’ll be right over.” She hung up and looked at Nick. “It was in the coffin. Theo hid it in an envelope in the lining of the coffin. It’s been there for sixty years. Do you think it could be the blue diamond?”
“Only one way to find out.”
“You don’t sound very excited.”
He chuckled and held her hand over the bulge in his jeans. “You are mistaken.”
Half an hour later they climbed into the Malibu and made the trip to Titusville.
“I can’t believe Theo took the risk of hiding the treasure in the lid of a coffin,” Daisy said, as her excitement mounted. “What if Miss Ora or Miss Olive had died sometime in those sixty years? Your Uncle Randolph would have buried the treasure with them.”
“Uncle Randolph was probably in on it. He and Pops came back from the war together. Anyway, we don’t know for sure that it is the treasure. Could be a deed to the house or old tax forms or nothing at all.”
“I know it’s the blue diamond,” Daisy said, smugly. “This is a day for happy endings.”
He reached for her hand and lifted it to his lips.
“I can’t argue with that.”
They retrieved the worn envelope from the mortician, who seemed a little disappointed that they didn’t open it in his presence. Back in the Malibu, Nick slit the flap and Daisy held her breath while he upended it in his hand and shook. A piece of folded paper slipped out along with a velvet drawstring bag. Nick handed the bag to Daisy. She worked the strings free and shook the contents into her hand. It was a ring. A heavy silver man’s ring.
Daisy’s eyes widened as she examined it. A silver-mounted pedestal formed a swastika. At the center sat a diamond as large as a robin’s egg and as blue as the summer sky at the center. She peered inside the thick band and found the initials A.H.
“Adolf Hitler,” Daisy breathed.
“The letter’s dated June 5, 1952 and signed by Pops,” Nick said. He looked at Daisy and began to read it aloud.
“In July of 1945 the survivors of my platoon were looking for souvenirs in the Führerbrau. I happened to find a metal box partially submerged in water from a burst pipe. In it I found this ring. I knew it was valuable both because of the diamond and for its historic significance but, unlike the stolen paintings, it could not be returned to the proper owners. It would become the property of the German government which, at that time, was non-existent. I decided to protect the ring until it was time to return it to a restored Germany when the time was right.”
Nick stopped to look at her and Daisy thought she’d drown at the warmth in his gray eyes.
“The right time was when he wanted you back in Mayville,” she said. “He saved the ring for your quest.”
Nick pulled her across the seat and into his arms. The ring bounced out of her hand and into the well of the car but neither of them made a move to retrieve it. He cupped her face in his big hands.
“In the end,” he murmured, “Pops was a hero. He gave me you.”
Daisy smiled just before he kissed her. Eventually they’d have to figure out to whom the ring belonged, but that could wait. Right now she just wanted to kiss and be kissed and bask in her very own happily ever after.
A word about the author...
Ann Yost is a former newspaper reporter and freelance humorist. The mother of three grown children, a daughter-in-law and a brand new son-in-law, she lives in Northern Virginia with her reporter husband, Pete, and Lucy, their golden retriever.
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