The Brontë Plot (31 page)

Her mom chortled softly. “I'm so sorry. That does sound horrible. Do I tell you to quit?”

Lucy skipped the question to ask her own. “What if he knows? What if he's heard me asking or heard about me asking and doesn't want to see me?”

“Lucy.” Her mom's tone signaled a lecture. “I need you to hear me. I've let you romanticize your father for a long time now, maybe too long, because I thought it was important. Every girl needs a dad, even if he's terribly flawed. And there were the books. He reached out every year and I thought that was good, but it's not healthy.”

She drew a long breath; the exhale blew across the ocean. “You are the one searching for him. He hasn't come back
ever
for you. Remember that. It's harsh, but it's true. And if by some miracle, you're right and you find him, then you must accept him for who he is and not who you want him to be—and not as someone who can have any power over you. You don't need his approval. Do you understand that?”

“Yes,” Lucy whispered.

“And if you don't find him, are you willing to let it go, come back, and live your life?”

Lucy closed her eyes and saw James.
Call me crazy, but I say we leave it all here. We take none of this home.
“Yes.”

“That lacked conviction.”

“I'm borrowing some, but it's enough.” Lucy rushed on, not willing to explain. “If there aren't any leads by tomorrow, I'll catch an afternoon train to Heathrow.”

“I wish I could help you.”

“You always help, Mom.” Lucy gazed out across the water. “I feel like if I could see him, I could put all this behind me and stop making the same mistakes. I'd get unstuck and I want that, Mom. I need that now.”

“He won't be able to give that to you even if he's cleaned up his act. And what if he hasn't? Lucy . . . Have you thought this through?”

“Sort of.” Lucy wiped under her eyes with the palm of her hand then flipped it over to wipe her nose. She knew her mom heard the snuffle when an “Oh, sweetheart” danced lightly to her ear.

Unable to stop more tears, Lucy pressed her thumb and finger into the inside corners of her eyes. “I have to go, Mom. I'll call you later.”

She tapped off her phone and shoved it into her bag. She then strolled back up Crag Brow and bought a ticket for The World of Beatrix Potter, wanting nothing more than to push through the green lattice gate and get lost for an hour.

Lucy wandered through the displays, delighted with the life-size replicas of Peter Rabbit, Benjamin Bunny, and all her childhood favorites displayed in diorama fashion. She patted Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle on the head, walked the lane toward Mr. McGregor's garden, and caught a glimpse of Squirrel Nutkin scurrying away without his tail. The exhibit ended at the statue of young Beatrix Potter releasing Jemima Puddleduck
to the sky, looking happy and free. Lucy patted that too.
You did good, Bea.

“Lucy?”

She froze, instinctively understanding the moment's significance. Twenty years in the making and she couldn't turn to face him too quickly. She felt her heart pound in her ears. If he'd said something more, she missed it within the roar inside her head.

She slowly spun and there he stood—only inches taller than herself and slighter than she'd remembered. He was delicate, like a distance runner, and smaller boned than even herself. His dark hair was cut short on the sides with gray dusting above the ears. She studied his mouth. He had the same mobile thin lips that she remembered always moving, smiling, curling around a new accent, or pursing in concentration.

“It's been a long time,” he said. His voice too—she recognized it with such clarity that he might have called her name yesterday and every day for the past twenty years.

She glanced up to his eyes and startled herself with the reflection of her own. Her mother had never said anything—and yet she had to have seen. Each and every time she looked at Lucy, she must have seen him. The similarity went beyond color. Identical arched brows—the right forming a
V
rather than a
U
at its apex—framed their deep-set green eyes.

He nodded at her. “I'd recognize you anywhere.”

“And me you.” She bit her lip, slowly letting it drag through her teeth. “How did you find me? Who told you I was here?”

“Joyce, at the tea shop, said someone was looking for me.
She said, ‘your daughter.' It could only be you.” He tilted his head back to the exhibit. “And this was a fair place to start.”

“She said she didn't know you.”

“She wasn't sure. I go by Montrose now. It was my mum's maiden name.” He stared a few seconds more. “Where are you staying?”

Lucy pointed across the street. “I got a room at The Old John Peel Inn. I liked the name. I had reservations at the Belsfield, but . . . Plans changed and their rooms were too expensive for just me . . . I'm babbling.”

“The John Peel is clean, but the food . . . I'd rather take you somewhere more comfortable. You . . . You will have dinner with me, won't you?”

“You're the reason I'm here.”

“I'm glad.” He spread his arm before him. “Come on then. We have some catching up to do.”

She fell into step beside him, saying nothing, simply glancing at him every few moments to convince herself he was real, and that he was handsome and trustworthy looking. She noted the incongruity of linking those but found she didn't care. He could be all three, but she only required the first and the last.

He walked down the hill to Ash Street and turned right. “It's a little touristy, but Don's a good man. He saves me a table when he can.”

Lucy followed him under the black awnings of Hyltons to a table in a side alcove. She thought back to Domestique in Chicago, with the one alcove and its incongruent 1950s wooden table amidst the sleek postmodern decor. That alcove matched this entire restaurant. The whole place held the same warm
and worn aesthetic. Servers moved in between tight tables while at least three different languages mingled in Lucy's ears. “This really is a tourist town.”

“Plenty of visitors, tours, tearooms, and treats. You name it, we've got it.” Her father raised his brows as he walked around the table and took the chair in the corner, looking out into the restaurant. Lucy sat across from him.

“You've grown so much. Look at you, you're an adult.” He leaned forward and rubbed his fingers across the tabletop. “I knew you were, of course, but in my mind, you're still eight. Each and every year on your birthday, you are eight.”

“The books did get a little more sophisticated.”

He laughed low and deep, naturally, like he did it often. “They did. When I arrived here last year, I wanted so badly to send you more Ransome, but you're grown up now. So I chose the Ruskin.”

“Your first nonfiction.” Lucy silently chided herself.
That's your first comment?

“It was and I selected it for a reason. But first, tell me about you. I've got twenty years to hear about.”

Lucy's eyes flickered. “I . . . How do I begin that?”

“Start at college and take me from there.”

Lucy recited what felt like part résumé, part life story. She told of studying art history in college because she loved it, business because she needed it, then not distinguishing herself in either because the library had a marvelous nook in a forgotten window, which was perfect for reading and which, in all four years, not another person discovered. So that was college. Good friends and hundreds of books.

She told about the computer programming class that led her to an internship at Sid's and how building him a database led to a job and now, she hoped, a career. She talked about girlfriends who stuck and a few boyfriends who'd drifted in and out of her life as quietly and gently as turning a page. She finally mentioned James. And there she stalled, unwilling to turn the page, afraid to find herself at the end of the book.

“So he's here?”

“In London with his grandmother. They'll head back to Chicago tomorrow morning.”

“I'll need to thank him for sending you on. This is nice, Lucy. I'm sorry it's taken so long.”

“About that . . .” Lucy took a bite of the pasta her father had ordered for them both and used the moment to formulate her question. “You sent me a book every year, but no note, nothing. Why
did
this take so long?”

Her father leaned back in his chair and wiped his mouth with his napkin, holding it there. He slowly lowered it. “I'm sorry for that. I . . . I'm not sure if your mom told you, but I spent some time in prison a while back.”

“Statesville in Joliet. I Googled the postmark and figured it out.”

“I should've expected that . . . That experience was unfortunate. A dear friend left me a significant gift from her estate and her children contested it. They claimed I defrauded her.”

“Did you?”

“She changed her will on her own and was in her right mind when she did it, but the judge didn't see it that way.” He waved his hands. “That's neither here nor there. I'm telling
you as a way of saying that I didn't want you to know about that then, and after, well, I had things to do. Time slipped away. But all that's in the past. Here you are.”

“Yes. I suppose it is.” Lucy dropped her eyes and mumbled, “Things to do.” She chewed on the phrase, wondering if it tasted sour, and soon found it had no taste at all. She looked back to her father, “What do you do? And how'd you get here?”

Her father's lips curved up on both sides. “You'll love it. I've got a good job going here.” He spread his arms wide on the table, gripping the edges. “And I've wanted to come back for years. When Mum died, Dad couldn't get out of England fast enough, but it was my home. I never forgot.” He surveyed the restaurant with a proprietary air.

“A couple years ago, I needed a break from the States so I came home. I understand this country and its pace and flavor. It's not so rigid. There is a flow of life, of understanding, in England and Europe that is at odds with American thought. But I'm glad you caught me now because next fall I'm heading down to the south of France for a few years to try out life in a warmer climate. It'll be time to move on.” He acknowledged a few patrons he knew before returning his attention to her.

“Willa and I picked out the village. You've got to explore while you're young, right? You hear me?”

“I hear you . . .” Lucy tried to smile. “Willa?”

“You'll like Willa. I met her last summer, but . . .” He narrowed his eyes. “She doesn't know I have a daughter—and certainly not one your age. She thinks I'm forty. I never told her that, mind you; she got it fixed in her head somehow and it's pointless to tell her differently now. She's closer to your age.
Thirty-three.” He bobbed his head as if making the introductions. “How long are you staying?”

“If I hadn't found you, I was going to leave tomorrow. I didn't think past that, but I'd like to stick around a few days, at least.” Lucy hiked a shoulder and let it drop. “Get to know each other?”

“Grand. I'll tell Willa about you tonight. Don't worry. I had you young. Happens all the time . . . Perhaps let's not mention your age, if you don't mind?” He let his voice lift as if the decision was her own.

Lucy nodded. And not until she felt a sting in her mouth did she realize she was biting the side of her cheek. She laid down her fork. “I don't need to stay.”

Her father reached his hand across the table and grabbed hers. “I want you to. This is our time.” He dropped his hand to motion for the check, and once he'd paid, he ushered Lucy from the restaurant with a small but firm pressure in the center of her back.

Chapter 29

T
he next morning Lucy climbed out of bed early and went for a walk. The town wasn't awake yet, but Pasty Presto down the hill was open and serving coffee. She grabbed a cappuccino and a small bun and ambled to her bench along the water.

The swans, probably fully aware of when the tourists brought their crumbs, hadn't arrived yet. She sat as the waves of Bowness Bay lapped the shore—tiny when compared
to
Lake Michigan, miniscule when compared to an ocean.

What she'd thought was a tsunami, twenty years pulling back from the shore, was hitting more like a ripple—changing nothing and unable to sweep the sands smooth.

Each tiny wave brought a discordant memory from the night before. Puzzle pieces that didn't fit. Or worse, puzzle pieces that did. She couldn't deny a picture was forming, one in confirmation of her mom's expectations rather than her own hopes. She kicked at the pebbles in front of her, skidding them into the water.

She tapped her phone. Nine o'clock. It was time. She tossed her paper cup into a bin and followed her father's directions to The Ship Inn. A little farther down the shoreline, the restaurant was already bustling with patrons and mature smells of grease, eggs, and fish when she arrived. She peered around and finally found her father and a young woman with brown cropped hair huddled in the corner. He was leaning over, talking close to her ear and smoothing her hair as if soothing a child. It was mussed, as if she'd worked to achieve the bed-tousled look, or had, in fact, just climbed from bed. Lucy glanced away.

“Lucy!” He half stood and waved, reaching around the woman to hug Lucy as she neared. “I'm glad you're here. Come meet Willa.”

Lucy stretched out her hand as she sat.

Willa grabbed it with well-moisturized, thick fingers. She gripped hard, rolling Lucy's knuckles across one another, and let go before Lucy could react. “Anthony told me you were here. In the year we've been together, I've never met any of his family. Never even knew about a daughter.” She threw Lucy's father a quick look before affectionately kissing his cheek. Lucy noticed a tiny diamond in her nose that caught the light as she swung her head back.