A Year of You (12 page)

“Somebody’d spilled something on the stairs, then after you fell, they wiped it up? Come on, Mattie. Listen to how that sounds.”

“I’m not making it up, West.”


“I didn’t say you were making it up. I said, listen to how crazy that sounds.”


“It’s the same thing!”


“No, it’s not.”


“You think I’m crazy.”


“No, I just think maybe you hit your head too hard. Tonight and the night you fell up the stairs.”

She pushed his hand away and adjusted the cold pack. “Forget it. If somebody kills me, it’ll make Emeline and Justine happy.”

“Why Justine?”

“That woman hates me. Every time she gets a chance she gets all passive aggressive. She flat-out told me the other day that she thinks I’m a slut here after McKendrick’s money. And at the restaurant, she told me ‘this family guards its secrets.’”

“How does your being a slut fit into all that, and what secrets? More stuff like you started to tell me about the night in the Navigator?”

Mattie rolled her eyes at his teasing insult. “Emeline told her she caught me and you doing the wild thang in the backseat. I don’t know what secrets. ”

“Ah. That would explain the cold shoulder from all the McKendricks.”


“I’m offering you a way to get out from under their thumbs.”

“Mattie, it’s not that easy,” he insisted through clenched jaws. She slid her hands down his arms, loving the feel of his warm skin, the crisp texture of his golden arm hairs.

“Make it that easy, West.” She stepped in front of him and made him look at her, indulging in her urge to frame his face in her hands. He gazed at her with the most uncertain look she’d ever seen.

“What’s in this for you?” he asked.

“You’ll be helping me be the kind of person I want to be.” She let her hands slide from his face to his hands. She held them tightly. “We’re just friends. I don’t expect anything more. This isn’t a made-for-tv movie or a romance novel. And if you want it that way, nothing at all has to ever happen between us.”


“I’ll never be able to pay back McKendrick if I don’t accept. Marriage is just such a huge thing. My parents instilled the ‘marriage is forever’ thing in my head.”


“If it makes you feel better, think of this as a business deal. You get the money, I get to try something new for a while, and come out with some money in the end.”
Plus I need some time to figure out where the real Elaine is.

West sat down on the bench in front of the vanity. “Just a year, huh?”

“Yeah. Less, even. Once you’ve got enough money to pay back McKendrick, I can leave.”

West let go of her hands and walked to the window, gazing out at the midnight-black river. The lights along the scattered private decks flickered and wobbled with the water’s current as far as he could see. The moon hid behind a thick formation of clouds. A faint halo gave away its position. “I barely know you, Mattie. How do I know you’ll actually give me the money?”

“We’ll open a joint bank account. You can transfer whatever you want to your personal account.”

He leaned on the sill and leaned his forehead against the cool glass of the window. Mattie perched on the wide sill next to him. He was quiet for long, long time.

“Fine. Let’s get married, Mattie.”

Mattie jumped off the sill and hugged him tight. “You won’t regret me, West. I promise. We can tell McKendrick tonight.”

“Yay. I’m excited about that conversation.” He frowned down at his hands and smirked. “What? No ring?”

Mattie laughed and shrugged. “Sorry.”

***

West snagged Emeline out of the state-of-the-art home theater as he and Mattie passed it on their way to the patio, where McKendrick was having his nightly cigar and sipping something alcoholic. Justine sat at the table with him, reading the latest Oprah Book Club selection.

McKendrick glanced up from his PDA when they trooped out to the patio. “What?” He didn’t spare any formality on West or Mattie.

West pointed at Mattie.
“We’re getting married,” he said simply.


Emeline squawked and dropped into the nearest bistro-style chair. “What?”


West ignored her, priding himself on the accomplishment. It actually felt good. “We’re going to get married. Any objections?”
Justine looked as if she were hyperventilating. She gripped her heavy crystal iced-tea goblet so tightly that her knuckles were white.

“It’s for the money, isn’t it?”


“Of course,” Mattie said.


“West,” Emeline whined. “You just proposed to me!”


“And you said no,” Mattie replied. “Lost your chance, sis.”

“Omigod, are you pregnant or something? I bet you’re knocked up. I’ve been here three whole days.”

“No. I just told you. It’s about the money.”

McKendrick’s mouth finally returned to its naturally closed position. West felt an absurd tremor of fear.

And Emeline tied his stomach in knots. In his heart he knew Mattie was right. Emeline was an obsession. Infatuation. He couldn’t see a future with her. He’d never be able to support her lifestyle of partying and designer fashions.

But she was so pretty, with the moonlight highlighting her skin in faint blue light, tinted golden by the light shining through the windows to her left.

So beautiful. So spoiled.
She hated rock and roll.
She hated his friends.
She hated his singing.
She only called when she wanted something. A date to a club—though she promptly left him the second they stepped in the door. He ended up sitting at the bar, drinking himself into something close to oblivion, watching her bump and grind with every guy but him.

There really wasn’t even a spark between them. Suddenly distanced from their relationship, he stared at it with horror. He’d wasted his entire life on the haughty little bitch.

Then she stuck her bottom lip out at him and flicked her hair over her shoulder. He fell for her again. A sharp pain of regret or something stabbed through him. He couldn’t really identify it.

All he knew was it turned Mattie into a gloating bitch, and Emeline into a teary-eyed beauty.

“Well, if you’re sure,” McKendrick said slowly. “I suppose I don’t object.”


“Daddy, no! West is supposed to marry me.”
McKendrick raised a single eyebrow in Emeline’s direction. Another sucker punch of phantom pain stole West’s breath. Where was this coming from? An hour ago she confessed she didn’t want to marry him. She didn’t even want to date him any longer. In moments she’d reduced him from a twenty-five-year-old man to a nervous fourteen-year-old.

What game was she playing?
“Sweetheart,” McKendrick said, as if speaking to a child. “West is not a suitable match for you.”

“Why not?” Mattie asked. “He’s human. He’s got all the right parts. He’s a good man, and he would take care of her.”


West felt really, really confused. What was Mattie doing?


“Matilyn, it’s not something you would understand,” Justine said. “West is a wonderful boy, but—”


“Oh, I get it. West isn’t really good enough, on a social or economic scale, right? Not for Emeline, anyway.”
Justine opened her mouth to reply but snapped it shut.
McKendrick only nodded.

“I wouldn’t have put it quite so bluntly, but yes, we expect Emeline to be with someone from a different sort of background.”

Mattie narrowed her eyes thoughtfully. Already West knew that look. She was going in for the kill. “Didn’t you start out with West’s father?”
McKendrick’s lips pressed together in a thin white line. West gripped Mattie’s arm and squeezed it in a silent warning. McKendrick didn’t like being reminded of his past.


Emeline wailed and flounced back in her seat. “Daddy, you can’t let her marry him. You know I love West!”


“You are so melodramatic.” Mattie crossed her arms and smirked at Emeline.


McKendrick twisted his glass in the condensation ring on the tabletop. “Now, Emeline, dear. Brant is about to lose his land. His home, his business. I’m about to take even that dilapidated hunk of metal he calls a truck from him. He will have nothing, Emeline. Do you still want him? And Mattie, if your sister decides she wants Brant, what will you do?”

West held his breath, waiting for Em to say something. What would Mattie say?

Mattie shrugged. “After the way she’s treated him, if he even considers taking her back he deserves her. The fact that this conversation is going on as it is already giving me second thoughts. She deserves him. She needs someone weak to walk all over.”

Mattie said, “Well, let me know what you decide. I’m going to bed.”

Without another word, she turned and marched into the house. West watched her walk away, at a loss, but not sure why. Granted, she did seem to lend him strength he didn’t have on his own. But it didn’t explain the urge to run after her.

Then again, maybe it did.

“I don’t want to live in a trailer,” Emeline said meekly.

“He won’t even have that in two months,” McKendrick said.

“I’ll get some of my trust fund money when I get married.” Emeline’s bottom lip poked out theatrically.

“It will take at least three months for the money to become yours. I refuse to pay the mortgage on your condo, if you chose to actually marry him. Where will you live, Emmie?”

Emeline paled and shook her head. “I guess I haven’t changed my mind after all. Sorry, Brant.”

West squeezed her shoulder. “No, you’re not. But it’s okay. I don’t think we would have made it much longer anyway.”

He ran inside and overtook Mattie outside her bedroom. She squeaked in surprise when he grabbed her shoulder.

“Oh no!” She smacked his hands away. “That little stunt downstairs completely killed anything other than tolerance for you, mister.”

“What stunt?” His face burned with embarrassment.

“I saw that expression on your face while you were waiting for Emeline to tell McKendrick what she wanted to do. You were still hoping she’d say she wanted you.”

“Mattie, come on. Let it go. I told you how it is.”

“You can’t let go. Why should I?” She took a deep breath and closed her eyes for a second. She caught his hand and took the ring out of his fist. “It doesn’t matter. What’s between us is business. Go ahead and lust after her until your dick explodes. You can let yourself out, right? I’m beat.”

“Yeah—”


She shut the bedroom door in his face.

***

Mattie waited until his muffled footsteps faded completely down the hall before she ran for the window. Her room overlooked the courtyard, the front yard, and the driveway. She pulled the sheer curtain aside and watched him steer his rattling, clunking truck down the long drive.

When the bright red dots of his taillight vanished down the private road, she sighed and leaned against the wall.

What was she doing? Was she insane? What was K going to say?

What was he going to do?
She pulled out her cell phone and dialed half of his number.
No. She couldn’t tell him. He was already pissed that she wasn’t willing to demand money.
After debating for another hour, she dialed his number.

“What?”
Quickly, she told him she was going to play her part a little longer.
“What do you mean, you’re going to act like one of them?” he yelled so loud she had to hold the phone away from her ear.


“I have to, K. And...I am one of them. I can’t get any money unless I stay longer.”

“You need to do what you need to do to get me that money. Think about who’s important to you, Mattie.”

“What do you mean?”


“Get me my money and you won’t have to worry about it.”
Mattie forced back tears. She thought furiously for an idea, anything. “K, if I stay for a little while, I think I can get even more money. They won’t tell me everything, not until the DNA results come back. Just give me a chance. You can hold out for a little longer, can’t you? Isn’t Isabella working something now anyway?”

She was talking too fast. He was going to know something was up.
“Whatever,” he said finally. “This ain’t happening again, Mattie.”


“I know. Never again.”
He hung up on her. Mattie turned her phone off completely and lowered herself slowly to the bed.

Her head hurt like someone had taken a hammer to it.

Chapter Nine

“Me and West are going to get married,” Mattie announced to Ruth Ellen. The young lawyer pretending to mind his own business glanced up from his newspapers, startled.

“I’m sure that has something to do with the trust funds?” Ruth Ellen asked. “A little presumptuous, don’t you think? What if you don’t find Elaine’s body?”

“I will, and even if I didn’t, I’d sue you for what’s rightfully mine. I may not be McKendrick’s kid, but I’m Karen’s. That entitles me to at least two of the trust funds.”

Ruth Ellen chuckled. “You’re my granddaughter, all right. But, just for your information, there is another stipulation--one McKendrick and I changed the day before you arrived. You have to be a biological Carruther-McKendrick to get a dime.”

Mattie gaped at the woman in the bed. “So you’re screwing me over even now? I’m not his kid! How the hell am I supposed to pass DNA tests?”

“I’ve taken care of it, Evelyn. Whether it’s the established funds you receive or a ‘gift’ from me, you will be financially compensated for your work.” Her voice softened. “And your past.”

Mattie sat down in the chair beside the bed. “I don’t understand why you kept Elaine. She wasn’t his either.”

Ruth Ellen sighed. “Jealous, are we? Would you rather have been killed at age five and buried alone in an abandoned orange grove with only a heart-broken little boy and a ‘crazy’ old woman left to mourn you?”

Mattie sighed. “How did they not know about me?”

“My daughter’s marriage to James was the next best thing to a business arrangement. Actually, very similar to this affair of yours and Brant’s. He needed financial backing. I told Karen it was the best for everyone, and she proposed marriage. I was able to make my investment grow, as well as help James make the best of his aspirations. It’s a shame that he’s sunk to the things he has, though.”

“Like what?”

Ruth Ellen gave Mattie a knowing gaze. “It’s none of your business. Jones, go over the stipulations with her again. I want her to make sure she knows one-hundred-percent what she is doing.”