A Family Affair: Winter: Truth in Lies, Book 1 Read online

  She looked away, pinched the bridge of her nose.

  “You think you had it worse? You don’t have a clue.” He gripped the door handle, forced himself to stay still when every cell in his body wanted to jerk her head up, make her acknowledge his words, feel his hatred. “Go home, Christine Blacksworth. You’re fourteen years too late.”

  ***

  Gloria accepted the fluted glass bubbling with Dom Perignon and smiled at the young man dressed in black who hadn’t left her side all night; Jeremy something or other, investment banker. He couldn’t be more than twenty-eight, a year older than Christine, and yet she hadn’t missed the way his dark eyes took in her pale blue gown, moved from the swell of breast to shoulder, settled on the smooth, tanned skin of her neck. Men had looked at her that way her entire life, from the time she was fourteen and discovered that if she smiled wide and long, dropped her voice a few decibels, and glanced instead of stared at other boys, she would gain not only their attention, but their admiration. What a ridiculous game it all was, one she’d never succumbed to, preferring intellect to sexuality. But then she’d met Charles.

  She sipped her champagne, tried to concentrate on what the young man was saying.

  “Have you ever heard Bocelli?” Jeremy something or other was saying. “I saw him in New York. He’s exquisite, not Pavarotti, but still quite good.”

  “And blind.”

  “Incredible, isn’t it?” He took her comment as interest, moved closer, his breath fanning her ear. “I’d love to take you. We could have dinner at The Presidio first. Next Saturday.”

  She took a step away, met his dark eyes, sparkling with one too many Dom Perignons. “I don’t think so, but thank you for the invitation.”

  He flattened a hand over his chest. “You wound me, beautiful maiden. Please reconsider.”

  Oh, Charles, how could you have left me to deal with this? “I could be your mother.”

  “But you’re not.” He took her hand, stroked his fingers up her arm.

  “I just buried my husband two weeks ago.” Was there no respect for the grieving process?

  “I know.” He nodded, his handsome face solemn. “All the more reason.”

  “Indeed.” She shrugged his hand off, stepped away. “All the more reason.” Gloria lifted her glass, saluted him and turned away.

  She almost hadn’t come tonight, not after last year’s debacle. The West Mount Memorial Banquet had always been Charles’s love; he was one of the original organizers, a major contributor and a staunch supporter of the hospital’s research facilities. But this love blinded him, too. When last year’s president asked Charles to double his annual pledge, to help fund research for cancers like your sister’s...Charles readily agreed.

  Tonight they were honoring him and had invited Gloria to accept an award in memory of her late husband. How could she refuse such a request? She’d chosen a pale blue Chanel and a clasp of diamonds for the occasion, the muted coolness of color and stone giving her a controlled, untouchable presence, elegant but not overstated, determined in a mask of subtlety but still appropriate for her newly widowed state—her life without Charles.

  She worked her way past the fringes of the ballroom to a tiny sitting area papered in heavy cream. There was a smattering of ornate chairs, cherry, she thought, done in burgundy and cream stripes set up in a half-circle around an oval glass table. And in the center of the table was a huge spray of red roses, more than two dozen, maybe three, spilling out of a gold vase, tufts of baby’s breath tucked in between.

  Her gaze followed a petal that had fallen on the slick surface of glass, landed on the edge of a bright blue ashtray. Gloria walked up to the table, studied the ashtray: shiny, clean, unused. She hesitated, fingers hovering over the single petal, its red brilliance not diminished by its solitary state. So much beauty, so much promise...She brushed it away in one quick motion, mindless of where it landed, her concentration fixed solely on the gleam of the blue ashtray. Then she flipped open her bag, pulled out the black case decorated with needlepoint roses, and tapped out a Salem Light. Her fingers shook as she lit it.

  “Now this is a sight.”

  Gloria swung around, pulled the cigarette behind her back. “What are you doing here?”

  Harry Blacksworth saluted her with his drink. “I was invited.”

  “As though you cared about contributing to anyone’s charity but your own.”

  He ignored her. “I saw you with that young boy a few minutes ago.”

  She took another puff on her cigarette, held it, blew out a thin cloud of smoke. “Since when did it become a crime to engage in casual conversation?”

  “Don’t embarrass yourself, Gloria.” He emptied his glass and added, “And don’t taint Charlie’s memory.”

  She stubbed out the cigarette in the center of the blue ashtray, grinding the butt to a third of its size. “You have nerve, Harry Blacksworth,” she said in a low voice, moving her lips just enough to push the words out for his ears alone. “You’ve disgraced this family for years and now you have the nerve to question my actions?”

  “You’re Charles Blacksworth’s widow. Act like it.”

  “I intend to.”

  “See that you do.”

  He turned away from her then, before she could tell him that he was the real disgrace no one had ever wanted to acknowledge, especially Charles. She wanted to scream at him so loudly that the entire room would turn and stare at Harry. You! Yes, you, you’re the disgrace!

  But, of course, she couldn’t because he was already gone and even if he weren’t, she wouldn’t. And he knew that.

  ***

  Nate Desantro was not going to stop her from tracking down Lily. He might think he had a fourteen-year edge, but she’d been competing in a man’s world long enough to know how to fight and win.

  When the sign for Magdalena shriveled to a dot in her rearview mirror, Christine opened her mouth and pulled in puffs of cold air, greedy to clear her mind. She should have been the one flinging accusations back there, making demands, not him. But he’d been vicious, the hatred pulsing in the cords of his neck, spreading to his throat, spilling out of his mouth. He’d hated her father.

  She drove on, mindless of the new snow falling heavy around her, white, pure, forgiving. What had life been like fourteen years before? She tried to remember, tried to pull it back through the haze of work-filled days at Blacksworth & Company, four years of college, senior prom, further still to family trips in Vail, Palm Springs, even middle school. But she could only snag scraps of memories, a half-formed picture of a girl in braces and pigtails, a blue spruce brilliant with lights and ornaments, a black dog named Jesse.

  Fourteen years of good-byes, promises to be home for Sunday dinner, returning with smiles and warm embraces, and all the while, going to her. How had she not known? How had she looked into her father’s eyes, listened to his words, and not been able to see the truth?

  Did he really love me? And Mother, what about her?

  They were his family, but had he really loved them or merely felt duty toward them—obligation—as one does to an old pair of tennis shoes, scuffed and ripping at the seams, that should be tossed out on garbage day but somehow never make it there. Instead, they get relegated as something else—garden shoes, lawn mowing shoes, anything to avoid being discarded completely. Maybe that’s what he’d done, relegated them to “something else,” a lower position, in order to avoid the costly, damaging choice of permanent separation.

  She thought of all the days he’d been with Lily Desantro, all the years he’d let his real family believe he was somewhere else. Her father was the only one she’d ever truly counted on, the standard for everyone else in her life: friends, boyfriends, business associates, even, and she hated to admit this, her mother. Had it all been a grand lie?

  Christine drove the remainder of the trip replaying the conversation with Nate Desantro. Part of her wanted to go back to Chicago, forget about the cabin and Magdalena, and most of all,
Lily Desantro. The other part worried that the woman would not be so easily forgotten. What if she showed up in Chicago asking for Gloria Blacksworth?

  Her mother would never be able to handle this. The thought of the two women, face to face, gave Christine renewed strength to drive back to Magdalena in the morning, confront Nate Desantro again if she must, though she hoped Lily would answer the door. Then Christine could tell her about the will, the enormous amount of money that would be hers, uncontested, and all she had to do was forget she’d ever heard the Blacksworth name.

  It was early afternoon when she reached the cabin. She’d stopped off at Henry’s Market, a small grocery store that wasn’t much larger than a 7-Eleven, and picked up a quart of skim milk, four raspberry yogurts, a box of Multi-Grain Cheerios, a bag of red licorice, and a small bottle of Palmolive Dish detergent. She’d almost asked the wrinkled man at the counter if he knew Charles Blacksworth. You probably saw him about once a month, she’d wanted to say. He came to stay in the cabin up the road. Of course, you’d remember him if you saw him...medium build, silver hair...distinguished...very polite.

  What if they were all mistaken, what if he really had been living in the cabin and only visited the woman once in a while? The shopkeeper would recognize him, wouldn’t he? She could find out, give herself hope that maybe he hadn’t lied about everything. But in the end, she’d said nothing.

  Chapter 5

  Harry answered the phone on the second ring. “Hullo?”

  “Uncle Harry? I’m sorry. Were you asleep?”

  “Chrissie.” He glanced at the woman lying in the middle of the bed, full breasts pointed skyward. “No,” he reached for his robe. “Of course not.”

  “I went to Magdalena today.”

  Harry stuffed one arm into his silk robe, then the other, letting the belt hang loose, exposing his nakedness. What time was it anyway? He glanced at the clock on the nightstand. Seven-thirty. He needed a drink and he needed to take a piss.

  “Did you see her?” He closed the bedroom door, kept his voice low.

  “No. I saw her son, though.”

  “Hardass. What’d he have to say?”

  “That...that...”

  “Tell me, Chrissie. What happened?” He poured himself a double scotch, neat, carried the glass and the bottle to the burgundy leather recliner, sat down.

  “Fourteen years, Uncle Harry. Fourteen years.”

  “What? What’s fourteen years?”

  “How long they were...together.” Pause. “How long he was seeing her, Uncle Harry. Fourteen years.”

  “Jesus.” He took a healthy swallow of scotch. “Jesus.”

  “All this time, all these years, and he’s been with her.”

  Fourteen years? Harry took another drink, drained his glass. “Desantro could be lying. We never heard the name before two weeks ago. This could all be a scheme to get more money; maybe the woman blackmailed him into leaving her a wad of cash so you and your mother wouldn’t find out and Charlie just figured he’d live long enough to change the will later. Shit, I don’t know. None of this makes any sense, but, I’d believe the mother and son were trying to blackmail your father before I’d believe he was,” he almost said, “screwing the bitch” but reworked it to “in a relationship with that woman for fourteen years.”

  “Really?”

  There was hope in her voice, clinging to one last shred of possibility, and he could not disappoint her, so he said, “I do, Chrissie. I think maybe they both set him up.”

  “I’m going back tomorrow.” She sounded more like the old Chrissie now. “I don’t care if I have to sit outside that house all day; I’m going to talk to Lily Desantro.”

  “This isn’t something you should do alone, kid. Let me come, too; it could get nasty. I can leave first thing in the morning.”

  “I need to handle this alone. But thank you.”

  “I don’t know if that’s such a good idea. This isn’t a boardroom; it’s real life and having me there might even out the playing field.”

  “I’ll be okay. Right now, I need you to keep an eye on Mom. I wouldn’t ask you if there was anyone else, but can you please do this?”

  He thought of Gloria crumpled over in her chair, whimpering the night she found out about Charlie. So much damn self-pity, too much for his patience. “I’ll keep an eye on her.”

  “Thank you, Uncle Harry. I’ve always known I could count on you.”

  They hung up after that, Christine sounding renewed. Harry had given her that even when he knew it might all be a big smoke job. But how could Charlie have been screwing the woman for fourteen years and never aroused suspicion? People left trails, somehow, somewhere, they always left trails.

  He owed Christine and Charlie, and he would do right by them. The last time he’d tried to do something honorable, his old man had pulled out his wallet and simply taken care of the situation. That was thirty-one years ago, and he’d hated him ever since.

  ***

  It was late morning when Christine pulled up outside the Desantro home. She’d waited a few hours before leaving the cabin, hoping Nate Desantro might not be there. He must have a job, other commitments that would pull him from the house.

  She locked the car and crossed the street, sloshing through the thick mix of snow and dirt. Brown sugar, that’s what it reminded her of as she kicked it with the toe of her boot, watched it fly in chunks around her. She climbed the steps of the white house, listening to the faint tinkle of snowman and Christmas tree chimes in front of her.

  The door opened before she had a chance to ring the bell. A woman stood in the entranceway, tall, lean, in a bulky wheat sweatshirt and jeans. She wore sandals on her feet, and her toes were long, slender, devoid of polish. Her hair, a spray of black mixed with gray, was tied back from her face. Tiny clusters of gray and brown stone dangled from her ears on golden wires. Christine took it all in: legs, feet, hair, ears, even hands that were rough and cracked with long fingers and blunt nails, these, too, without polish. And then she looked at the woman’s face. It was tanned with tiny lines fishing out from her eyes and around her mouth, perhaps from years of laughter, or perhaps not. Her nose was narrow with delicate nostrils, lips thin, cheekbones high, skin pulled tight, free of makeup and blemishes. There was an ethereal quality about her that made Christine want to examine each detail to determine where the line of physical beauty ended and the intangible factors began.

  “Christine.”

  She had a soft, low voice, soothing even. Christine sucked up these details before lifting her gaze to the woman’s eyes. They were hazel, clear, like the mist off a fresh mountain spring.

  “I need to talk to you.” After days of rehearsing, she was suddenly speechless.

  “Yes. Come in.”

  The interior of the living room boasted an eclectic gathering of color and fabric that in some bizarre manner both calmed and aroused the senses. The walls were pale blue with large oil paintings hanging from them. One featured a field of wildflowers, the canvas covered in brilliant splashes of red, yellow, green, and orange. Another was of a house in a snow storm, the same long, broad brush strokes trailing through the snow. The third painting held the identical strokes but it stood out from the others. Done in blue and black hues, it was of a child curled up in a blanket asleep, long black hair brushed partway over her face.

  There were pots of flowers, dried and fresh, scattered in bowls and vases, and a Boston fern hanging from a hook in the ceiling, its leafy fronds stretching to touch the tip of a rocking chair. The furniture consisted of a rocker, two side chairs, and a love seat, all old but comfortable- looking in matching shades of faded burgundy, navy, and cream florals. The floor was a dark, bare wood, oak maybe, with an area rug woven in shades of black, burgundy, green, and tan. A wind chime hung in the far corner, this one in the shape of a sunflower. There were baskets stuffed with magazines, Forbes sitting on top.

  Christine tore her gaze away, moved to a chair and sat down. Four small bowls r
ested on the coffee table in front of her, each carved from different wood, each a different style. They were smooth and glossy, the fine grains of the individual wood woven throughout. One was filled with rose petals; another, lavender; the third, pine cones; and the last, holly leaves. A phonograph rested against one wall.

  Lily Desantro followed her gaze. “Archaic, isn’t it?” A faint smile pulled across her thin lips. “Oh, but it plays a lovely sound. Charlie loved to dance.”

  Christine pictured them gliding across the wooden floor, smiling, laughing. He’d never danced with her mother. “Is it true that you and my father were having an affair for fourteen years?”

  “We…were involved, yes.” She ran a hand through her long hair, braided in the back. “It was very complicated.”

  “You mean because my father was married?”

  “Yes, there was that. No matter what happened between your father and me, he loved you, Christine. He always loved you.”

  “How do you know? Did he tell you? Did you talk about me?”

  The woman reached for the chain around her neck, fingered it. It was then that Christine noticed the small gold cross. “I’m so sorry.”

  “For what? That the man I admired most in the world was a liar and a cheat?”

  “I’m sorry we’ve caused you pain, but I’m not sorry I loved your father.” She straightened, pressed her fingers over the cross. “I can never be sorry for that.”

  It was time to deal with her and get out. “I want you to forget you ever heard the Blacksworth name.”

  “I want my memories just as much as you do, Christine,” she said. “Charlie’s a part of me; he’ll always be a part of me.”

  “He left you a large sum of money in his will. I’ll see that it’s disbursed as soon as possible, no point of contest, no complications”—she met the woman’s gaze—“as long as you don’t contact us. Ever.”