Petals on the Pillow (6 page)

“But Kendra will be there.” Betsy chewed her lower lip. Kelly ignored the slight whine in Betsy’s tone. Whatever the little girl’s problems were with her father’s assistant had nothing to do with Kelly. “Big deal. So will I. Besides, what could Kendra possibly have against the idea of an aviation mural?”

“Yeah, you will be there.” The grin reappeared. Betsy took Kelly’s hand and started walking again. “What supplies do we still need?”

“I need to make sure somebody actually got all the things on the list I sent a couple weeks ago. And some other stuff, like old sheets for keeping the floor and furniture protected, some rags, a few buckets—all things Mrs. Jenkins probably has laying around.”

Betsy picked at the banister around the rotunda while Kelly stopped to peer at a painting that took up most of the back wall of a recessed alcove. “Why didn’t you just have Jenkins or some
body do all the stuff you’re doing now? Anybody could patch cracks and put on a coat of primer.”

“Hmm,” Kelly murmured, her nose still pressed to the glass. “
I know, but not everybody would do it just the way I want it. If I do it myself, I’ll be able to make sure it’s done right. I also won’t have anyone else to blame if something goes wrong. Christ! This thing’s filthy.”

Kelly blew a small puff of breath at the frame. A tiny mush
room cloud of dust rose up in front of her face. She sneezed. “When was the last time someone dusted these things?”

Betsy shrugged and grabbed Kelly’s hand. “Dad cut down on Mrs. Jenkins’ day help a while back. He said we didn’t need to keep the place like a showroom anymore.” She yanked on Kelly’s hand again. “C’mon. I’m hungry.”

Kelly let Betsy drag her along, but gestured back to the little alcove. “Some of that stuff is gorgeous. I’d really like to see what’s under that layer of dust.”

“Yeah. Yeah. They’ll still be here, still be gorgeous and still be filthy after we get something to eat. You can look at them
when I’m not about to faint from hunger.”

“Don’t you think you’re being a little over-dramatic?”

“No. I think we didn’t take a break for lunch.” Betsy rolled her eyes and kept tugging on Kelly’s arm. “And trust me, nobody is ever dramatic around this place. Everything here is reasonable and logical and incredibly boring.”

No sooner were those words out of Betsy’s mouth than a muffled male voice raised in anger split the habitual silence of Hawk Manor. Betsy froze in her tracks right outside the doors to Harrison’s office with Kelly right behind her.

“No. I will certainly not sign this ... this ... thing!” the voice bellowed again, this time more clearly. “What are you trying to do, Harrison?”

Betsy’s eyes grew wide. “It’s Uncle David,” she whispered. “But he and Daddy are fighting. They never fight.”

“Uncle David?”

The girl nodded, held her finger to her lips and began tip
toeing backwards. “He hasn’t been here in months,” she whispered. “I don’t think we should be here. Daddy will be mad if he thinks we’re listening.”

“I thought you said nobody ever got dramatic around here,” Kelly whispered back furiously.

Betsy held her hands up in a gesture of helplessness. Harrison’s voice rang through the door with ice cold clarity. “I think it’s perfectly obvious what I’m trying to do, David. I’m trying to buy your shares of St. John Industries.”

“Damn it. We built that place together. I’ve invested half my life in St. John’s.”

“Yes, well, I’ve invested half my family’s fortune. And I’m prepared to invest the other half if that’s what it takes to get you out of there.”

Betsy gestured frantically to Kelly to follow her away from the office doors, but Kelly’s feet seemed unwilling to respond to what her brain was telling them. She stayed stuck to the ground. She didn’t want to eavesdrop, but something held her to that spot directly in front of Harrison St. John’s study. Her feet simply would not obey her mental commands to move.

The stranger’s voice continued, “And are you prepared to run the place yourself, Harrison? You haven’t even visited headquarters in over a year. Do you really think you’re plugged in enough to what goes on there day by day to keep it running?”

“Is that some kind of threat, David?” Harrison’s asked. His tone was carefully nonchalant, but even through the doors Kelly could hear the menace beneath the civility.

“Of course not,” Harrison’s companion snapped. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“One thing I refuse to ever be again is ridiculous. Now take the contract, David, and get out.”

“I won’t. I’ll never sign it, Harrison.”

“Fine. Then I’ll get my company back the hard way. But rest assured, David, I will get my company back. I won’t give you the chance to kill anything else important to me.”

“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about, Harrison. You don’t make sense. You could at least tell me why you’re doing this. After all these years, couldn’t you at least tell me why?”

The next words that came out of Harrison’s mouth were filled with such malice, Kelly’s blood ran cold. “The fact that you can ask me that question, David, makes me realize again exactly what kind of a man you are. Now get the hell out of my house!”

With those words, the double doors into the office suite burst open and a man came stumbling through them. Harrison stood behind him. Kendra was at Harrison’s shoulder. Kelly, frozen in place in front of them, had no time to clear out of the stranger’s way. He barreled into her, sending her skittering flat on her fanny across the marble floor. The man windmilled his arms and caught himself just before he would have overbalanced and toppled onto Kelly. Instead, he just loomed over her.

Kelly looked up into a face of such astonishingly perfect proportions and boyish good looks that Robert Redford in his heyday would have wept with en
vy. Blonde hair, a little over-long, was brushed casually back from his handsome square-jawed face.

“Well, well, well, what have we here,” he said, extending his hand down to her. Kelly took his hand, expecting to be helped to her feet. Instead, he only turned her hand over and inspect
ed it mildly. He ran his thumb along a streak of plaster on her palm still making no effort to help her. “You must be the artist. I heard all about your arrival in town.” Kelly tried to draw her hand back from him, but he clung to it tenaciously.

“That’s right. I’m the artist. Formerly known as Kelly Donovan.”

“Cute. Very cute,” he said, never taking his eyes from hers.

He grinned down at Kelly with a smile so infectious and so inviting, she almost forgot that he had just knocked her ass over teakettle on a hard marble floor. It was the kind of smile that could make a young woman forsake her father to climb down a ladder into a waiting lover’s arms. It was the kind of smile that Spencer Tracy used to give to Katherine Hepburn. It was, Kelly noted, the kind of smile that made women weak in the knees.

“My name’s David Clark. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Kelly Donovan.”

“I’d say the pleasure was all mine, but my present position would probably make that an obvious untruth,” Kelly shot back from her uncomfortable position.

The grin broadened. Kelly wondered how many women did simply swoon at his feet at the sight of his perfectly white and even teeth.

“So sorry,” he said. “Let me help you up.”

David had Kelly halfway up off the floor when a hard, broad hand grasped his shoulder. Harrison stood behind him, looking so much like a Roman god in a fury that Kelly half expected him to raise his hand and call down a brace of thunderbolts. Instead he said, “Get your hands off her.” He pushed the other, smaller man backwards.

Clark whirled. Unfortunately, he didn’t let go of Kelly’s hand to allow her to plop gently back down on the floor. For some reason, he tightened his grip on her. Still off-balance and only partially standing, Kelly hurled through the air as if she was the end of the line in some macabre adult version of crack- the-whip.

She felt her rear end hit the floor again and wondered briefly if she would ever regain even the slightest shreds of her dignity. She slid backwards and her head was filled with a loud cracking noise. Everything went black.

Chapter Four

Kelly knew that she couldn’t have been out for more than a few moments. She returned to consciousness as she was being lifted into the air. Awareness crept back in from the corners of her mind. Kelly felt strong arms cradling her against a chest that seemed a mile wide and hard as a rock. Betsy’s clear piping voice registered on Kelly’s senses from what seemed to be a great distance. “Daddy, what did you do?”

“I’m not sure yet,” Harrison answered. His voice strained and tense.

Damned if even through this crushing headache, Kelly thought, his voice didn’t set up vibrations Kelly couldn’t quite believe, especially pressed up against his chest this way. She cracked open one eyelid and peered up at Harrison’s somewhat ashen face. “Near as
I can tell, you involved me in some kind of testosterone-induced male playground dispute and then threw me into a wall.”

“It was a pillar.” Harrison glared down at her. “And it appar
ently had no impact on your power of speech.”

Kelly smiled weakly back. “Nothing ever does.”

“I should have known,” Harrison snorted as he backed through the swinging doors to the kitchen. The sudden change in light from the dim hallway to the bright kitchen made Kelly wince and clamp her eyes shut. And so she heard, rather than saw, Dora Jenkins’ gasp.

“What on earth happened?” the housekeeper asked.

“An accident, Dora,” Harrison said impatiently. “Would you get me some wet cloths and some ice and then call Dr. McIntyre?”

“Right away.”

Kelly heard the bustle of Mrs. Jenkins’ apron and dress hurrying away. “No doctors,” she groaned.

Harrison deposited Kelly gently on a kitchen chair. He peeled her fingers away from her face. “Someone needs to look at your head, Kelly. You blacked out. There could be concus
sion, fracture, or worse.”

A strangled whimper came from the direction of the door. Kelly made a tunnel with her hands to shield her eyes from the light and peered over to see Betsy hopping from foot to foot with anxiety. The little girl picked frantically at her sweater and her face was so screwed up with tension Kelly was amazed she could see straight.

“It’s all right, Betsy,” she said. “I’m fine. Your father is just being an old worry wart.”

“I am not a worry-wart,” he said to Kelly. “You need to see a doctor.”

“I don’t want to see a doctor.” The loudness of her own voice made Kelly wince and clap her hands over her eyes again.

Once again, she felt the hard masculine grasp of Harrison’s hands peeling her fingers back. He looked into her eyes, his own mirrors of concern and compassion. “Why don’t you want to see a doctor, Kelly?” he asked, his voice soft.

“Because I can’t afford one,” she whispered back. “Especially not one who makes house calls to isolated islands.”

“Dr. McIntyre lives over by the ferry landing. He can be here in less than half an hour. And as for the expense....” Harrison shrugged. “I’ll take care of it.”

Kelly shook her head which served only to set the room swaying to a reggae beat and said, “I don’t want your charity, Harrison. My head is fine. I just need to lie down for a bit.”

“It’s not charity. It’s a necessity,” he countered.

Kelly heard the swish of Mrs. Jenkins’ apron and the clinking of ice. In a moment, a beautiful cooling sensation started at her throbbing head and spread down her neck.

“Aaaah,” she sighed. “That’s better.” She wiggled her fingers toward the door. “Come hold my hand, Betsy.”

Kelly, eyes still closed, felt Betsy’s cold little fingers thread through hers and the girl’s smooth cheek against her hand. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered.

“Whatever for?” Kelly asked. “Because I’m too slow to get out of the way of an impending fistfight?”

“Please don’t go,” Betsy begged.

Kelly screwed open one eye, cringing again at the light. “No one’s going anywhere and no one’s blaming you, Betsy. It’s going to be fine.” She stroked the fine dark hair and was rewarded with a troubled little sigh.

“Here, Dora,” Harrison said from behind Kelly. “I’ll deal with the ice. You go call Dr. McIntyre.”

“I told you I don’t need a doctor, Harrison.”

“And I told you that you’ll have one anyway. Think of it as a preventive measure on my part in case you decide to sue me.”

“You think I’d sue you?” Kelly felt a nearly overwhelming desire to kick him in the shins, and might have if she thought she could have turned around without passing out again.

“Not really,” he said dryly.

“But—”

“Kelly,” Harrison interrupted, “shut up for once.”

So they sat and waited in silence until Dr. McIntyre came banging through the kitchen’s swinging doors, with Dora Jenkins scurrying behind him, almost exactly a half an hour later. By the time he arrived, the pounding in Kelly’s head had slowed to a dull throb, and the bright sunlight shining through the window over the big double sink no longer made her feel
like a knife was being plunged into her brain.

The doctor wasn’t exactly what Kelly had expected. Somehow she’d pictured the doctor for the little island as a kindly old gentleman with white hair and a cane. She certainly hadn’t anticipated seeing someone walk through the door, which Betsy had just been ushered out through, wearing chinos and a polo shirt and not looking any older than her own 26 years.

“You’re sure you’re out of med school?” she asked as he peered into her eyes with a tiny light.

“Positive,” Dr. McIntyre replied, not at all nonplussed.

“It wasn’t one of those mail order things, was it?”

“
Nope. Good ole U-Dub. Just a ferry ride away.” He circled around Kelly, probing her skull with his fingers. “Just a happy recipient of one of Mr. St. John’s special island scholarships.”

“Island scholarship?”

“Yep. He’ll pay your tuition as long as you promise to return to the island for at least five years after you’re done with your schooling.”

“For everyone?”

“No, but for quite a few. There’s an application process. Ms. Campbell oversees it.” McIntyre hummed as he flashed a pen- light into Kelly’s eyes. “He and Mrs. St. John used to take quite an interest in their scholarship students. Since she died, Ms. Campbell has taken it over. Not quite as personal, maybe, but it’s still a great deal.”

“Very generous,” Kelly observed.

“Also very pragmatic. He gets a very well-educated job force to choose from.” McIntyre continued to feel Kelly’s skull.

“Ouch!” Kelly yelped as McIntyre found the spot where her head had connected with the stone pillar in Hawk Manor’s rotunda. He patted her shoulder and called Harrison back into
the room.

“Looks like a mild concussion,” he finally concluded. “So how exactly did this happen?

Kelly and Harrison exchanged a long look. “It was, uh, an accident,” she said slowly. “I stumbled.”

McIntyre looked back and forth between Kelly and Harrison. A frown creased his cherubic brow. He seemed about to speak then abruptly clamped his lips shut and shrugged. “As you wish, Ms. Donovan. Here’s the drill. Take it easy for the rest of the day. Rest, but no napping, please. Just as a precau
tion, I don’t want you to sleep for more than an hour or two at a time tonight.”

Kelly nodded. “I’ll set the alarm on my watch. It’ll go off every hour.”

McIntyre grimaced. “Not exactly ideal, but I guess it’ll do. I’d prefer it if someone else could check on you a few times during the night. Make sure you’re actually waking all the way up and that you’re still lucid. But you seem pretty solid. I guess the watch would work.”

“We’ll take care of it, Doctor,” Harrison interrupted smoothly. “Anything else we should know?”

McIntyre looked from Harrison to Kelly again and shook his head. Snapping his bag shut, he said, “Don’t think so. I’ll leave a list of symptoms to watch for, but I doubt Ms. Donovan will have any trouble. Call me if you have any other questions. No, please don’t get up,” he said to Harrison who had been about to rise from where he knelt in front of Kelly. “I can see myself out.”

With the doctor gone, the silence between Harrison and Kelly in the sunny kitchen seemed deafening. He held her hand, stroking his thumb against its back.

“I bled all over your suit,” she said softly.

“I’m so terribly sorry, Kelly.”

“Me, too. Do you think it’ll wash out?”

“I’m not talking about the suit.”

Kelly met his gaze and immediately wished she hadn’t. She felt herself sway like a drunken boa listening to the snake charmer’s flute. His long fingers caressed her wrist. Kelly’s traitorous heart quickened a little. This was a distraction she simply couldn’t allow. She told herself it was just the knock on the head that made her dizzy, but a voice from back in the achy part of her brain begged to argue.

“It’s all right.” Kelly’s smile was timid and small. “I have a very hard head.”

“Good thing.”

“So are you going to tell me what that was all about?” Harrison’s eyes closed like shutters and opened again, expressionless. “I’m sorry you had to see that.”

“See it? I think I did a little more than see it.”

“Fine,” he sighed. “I’m sorry you had to participate in it.” He let the silence stretch between them.

“Who is David Clark anyway?” Kelly finally asked.

Harrison suddenly seemed to find a spot on the linoleum completely fascinating. He kept his gaze on the floor as he said, “For at least a little while longer, he’s my business partner.”

“Trouble in the paradise of St. John’s Industries?” Kelly inquired.

Harrison snorted. “Not exactly. The business is fine. The stock market goes up and down like a roller coaster and we just inch up, bit by bit.”

“Then why the nasty break-up?” Kelly watched Harrison’s profile as his jaw tensed. A vein throbbed at his forehead.

“Let’s just say that I have reason to believe that Mr. Clark is no longer completely trustworthy and leave it at that, shall we?” He looked up and favored Kelly with one of his rare smiles. “Now let’s get you settled and comfortable for the day.”

***

Harrison’s idea of “comfortable for the day” was Kelly’s idea of a screaming claustrophobic fit. After three hours in her room working on drawings for Betsy’s mural, she was crazed.

“Come on, lazy bones. Let’s go dig up some of those old sheets Mrs. Jenkins said were lying around in the east wing. Then we can get to work priming the wall in your room.” Kelly elbowed Betsy who lay on the bed next to her.

Betsy looked at her with narrowed eyes. “Daddy said you were supposed to rest this afternoon.”

“Oh yeah? Well, we’ve got a schedule to keep and just because your Dad is paying me doesn’t mean he’s the boss of me. Got it?”

“
I got it.” Betsy rolled her eyes. “As long as you’re the one who tells him that. What do you want to do?”

“Not much. Just gather up the supplies so we can get to work tomorrow.”

“I think Mr. Jenkins piled it all up in the east wing.” Betsy led the way out of Kelly’s room, through the central portion of the house and into the other wing. They tramped through half a dozen rooms or more, all with furniture covered in sheets and drop cloths. Kelly could make out the elegant profiles of tasteful couches and reading chairs, lamps and tables, bookcases and armoires. It was in about the seventh room that she spotted a shape she couldn’t identify. It looked like a tent made of white sheets draped across chairs.

“What the heck is that?” she asked as she strode across the floor to peek under the sheet.

“No! Don’t go in there!”

Betsy’s plea came too late. Kelly had already lifted the sheet. One glance told her more than enough about the spot and why
Betsy didn’t want her to see it. In one quick look, Kelly recognized it for exactly what it was.

It was a hiding place. A very special hiding place. One that hid more than just the body. A place where you could hide a sore and aching spirit. Kelly instantly recognized it because she’d had one like it. Well, not exactly like it. She hadn’t had an entire wing of a mansion and all its furnishings with which to work. Her hiding place had been a tiny little thing, tucked away behind a couple of ladderback chairs in one small corner of the attic in her parents’ old house on Diversey, not a grand tent in the middle of a palatial bedroom.

Aside from scale and furnishings, however, there were many similarities. The photographs lovingly arranged. Articles of clothing. An old sweater that might hold a familiar scent. A special scarf. Bits and pieces of ornament that undoubtedly held great significance: a miniature crystal rocking horse, a heart-shaped jewelry box, a string of amber beads.

All in all, the perfect spot for a little girl to go when she needed to privately mourn a mother for whom she wasn’t allowed to publicly grieve.

Kelly picked up one of the photographs. A lovely dark-haired woman smiled up at her. A shiver passed through her. Something about the woman struck a chord of familiarity in Kelly’s mind. Hazel eyes, just a tad slanted like a cat’s, glowed with an intelligence that still spoke. A brace of freckles scattered across her nose brought a mischievous touch to the knowing smile that curved her full and sensuous lips. A beautiful woman. Kelly wished they could have really met.