Haunting Olivia Page 20

  237

  anyway. Different dream children, different results?

  Maybe it meant something good would happen.

  Still, she raced up the stairs and opened the door to Kayla’s room. Kayla’s bed was empty. Frantic, Olivia ran into Zach’s room to wake him up. But his bed was also empty.

  She dashed back downstairs. Silence. Then a faint clinking sound. She followed the sound into the kitchen. And there sat Kayla and Zach, stirring hot chocolate in mugs.

  “Sorry,” Zach said to Olivia. “We tried to be quiet so we wouldn’t wake you.”

  “We’ve been talking for like a whole hour,” Kayla said, smiling. “Everything’s okay again.”

  Olivia felt her heart move in her chest.

  The next morning, Kayla at school and Zach at work, Olivia went shopping in town, looking for something special for Kayla. She wanted to give her something to celebrate the process of competing in the pageant, so that no matter what happened in the end, Kayla had something from her mother that said: You are inner beauty.

  As she neared a jewelry shop, she decided that a locket necklace would be perfect. A heart to symbolize her love for Kayla. And the space inside the locket to symbolize that what was inside was up to Kayla.

  With Valentine’s Day just around the corner, Olivia wasn’t surprised that the store was so busy.

  She browsed, settling on just the gold necklace she wanted, when she felt someone staring at her. She 238

  Janelle Taylor

  glanced up into the cold eyes of Jacqueline McCord, Deenie’s mother.

  “Hi, Jacqueline,” Olivia said.

  “How do you know my name?” the woman asked coldly.

  That flustered Olivia a bit. “I’m sure I heard your name at one of the pageant meetings.”

  “No, I’m sure you didn’t,” Jacqueline said. “Because the mothers weren’t introduced. Did Zach tell you about me?”

  Olivia glanced around the crowded store. If she were alone with Jacqueline, she’d be very worried.

  “To be honest, I mentioned that I saw you for the first time at the General Store and described you, and he said it sounded like Jacqueline McCord.”

  “I’m surprised he’d know what I look like,” she said.

  Olivia turned her attention to the display case.

  “I’m interested in buying this locket necklace.”

  “It figures you’re back now,” she continued.

  “Now that Zach is a rich architect and everyone in town thinks he walks on water. Thirteen years ago, you wanted nothing to do with him or his trailer trash kid.”

  Olivia gasped but quickly controlled herself. “I’ll give you one more opportunity to make a sale, Jacqueline. I’m interested in buying the locket necklace.”

  “You’re not even denying it!” she said. “When I was interested in Zach, he had nothing. He barely had parents. He had zilch to offer, and I still fell for him.”

  This entire conversation was insane. “Jacqueline, I think you’re forgetting that I’m the mother of his HAUNTING OLIV IA

  239

  thirteen-year-old daughter. I fell for him when he was seventeen—although I’d hardly say he had nothing to offer. He had a lot to offer.”

  “Save it for the Inner-Beauty Pageant judges,” she said.

  “I’m not competing,” Olivia said as she turned and left.

  She wrapped her scarf tightly around her neck as she stepped back into the cold winter air. There was a jewelr y store in the next town. She just prayed no one in there had ever heard of Zach Archer.

  Olivia had just finishing clasping the locket necklace around Kayla’s neck when the doorbell rang.

  The Abernathy twins, Deenie McCord, and Brianna Sweetser.

  “We’d like to talk to Kayla,” Brianna said.

  Olivia didn’t like this one bit. “Kayla,” she called,

  “the other contestants are here.”

  Kayla came running to the door. “Where’s Cecily?”

  Brianna ignored her question. “We’re here as a group to tell you we’ve voted you out of the pageant. If you really had inner beauty, you’d do the right thing and withdraw.”

  Kayla glanced at Olivia, then back at Brianna.

  “Why should I withdraw?”

  “Because we all know you’re behind everything that’s been going on.”

  “Does Cecily think so?” Kayla asked. “I notice she’s not among you.”

  “We don’t brainwash as easily as Cecily,” Eva said.

  “Girls,” Olivia said, “Kayla isn’t withdrawing from the pageant. We were about to sit down to dinner, 240

  Janelle Taylor

  so if you’ll excuse us.” Olivia closed the door, and Kayla’s eyes filled with tears.

  “They all hate me,” she said.

  “Kayla, I’m really sorry this whole experience is being marred by all this trouble,” Olivia said. “I know it’s hard, but if you could just try to focus on what you’re doing, working on your essay and speech, continuing your great job at school, you’ll be fine.

  Try not to think too much about those girls.”

  “Because they’re jealous bitches?”

  Olivia was so startled she almost dropped the cup of tea she’d made to calm herself from her en-counter with Jacqueline. “Kayla!”

  “Well, they are bitches and they are jealous,”

  Kayla said. “I hate them all.” She ran upstairs and slammed the door, then blasted her stereo.

  Olivia’s cell phone rang. Please be Zach saying he’s coming home with takeout and a bottle of wine. . . .

  It was Ivy! She had off Wednesday from work and would fly up in the morning. Olivia was so excited she immediately called Amanda. The three sisters would be meeting at the cottage in just two days.

  As always Zach accompanied Olivia to the cottage on Wednesday morning to await Johanna. But Olivia could barely get the door open.

  The place was trashed. Everything was upturned.

  Broken glass and pottery littered the floor. Even the sofa had been slashed. And the painting of William and the three Sedgwick girls had been splattered with what looked like motor oil.

  And on her bedroom wall, scrawled in marker HAUNTING OLIV IA

  241

  was: “LIKE MOTHER, LIKE DAUGHTER. DIRTY

  WHORES.”

  Olivia gasped. Zach let out a string of expletives.

  “Hello?”

  Johanna stood in the doorway, glancing around at the mess. “Looks like someone trashed the place.”

  “Looks like it,” Olivia said. “Any idea who?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Johanna said, angry yet nervous.

  “Here are your receipts,” Olivia said, practically throwing the slips at the woman. She took the clipboard out of Johanna’s hand, signed it, and handed it back. “From now on, I’ll either come to your shop to deal with this or you can come to Zach’s house.”

  “I’ll need to check with the lawyer about that,” Johanna said. “If he says it’s no problem, I’ll just come to Zach’s every morning at eight.”

  Zach called the police. In minutes, two officers and half the town were on the doorstep. According to the officers, there didn’t seem to be a single clue left behind.

  Big surprise when Marnie Sweetser’s cousin was on the force.

  “Professional courtesy” got Ivy nowhere.

  When Olivia called both Ivy and Amanda en route and explained why they should meet at an alter-nate location—Zach’s—instead of the cottage, Ivy said her first stop in town would be the local police.

  “You’d think the trashing of a house in that neighborhood would be big news in Blueberry,” Ivy said when she arrived at Zach’s. “The officer I spoke with acted like it was on a par with jaywalking!”

  242

  Janelle Taylor

  “I’ve got a lot to fill you in on,” Olivia said, hugging her youngest half sister. “It’s so good to see you, Ivy.”

&nb
sp; “You too, Olivia,” Ivy said, her beautiful green eyes concerned. “I’m worried about how personal the attack on the house seemed to be.”

  And Olivia hadn’t even told her about the message scrawled on the bedroom wall.

  “I’m okay,” Olivia assured her, squeezing her hand.

  “Is Amanda here yet?” Ivy asked.

  Just then, an unfamiliar white car pulled into the driveway. “Yup,” Olivia said, with a smile.

  As Amanda got out of her car, her shiny long brown hair gleaming in the bright sunshine, she glanced around at the house and grounds. “Gorgeous property. I don’t remember this house, though. And I used to walk down to this part of the beach a lot during my summers.”

  “Zach built the house around eight years ago,”

  Olivia explained. “He’s an architect.”

  “So tell us everything,” Amanda said as they went inside. “How did you meet? Are you having a hot and heavy romance?”

  As the sisters settled into the living room, coffee brewing and two full hours before Kayla would be home, Olivia took a deep breath and told Ivy and Amanda everything.

  Amanda sucked in her breath. “Oh, Olivia. Just to think of you going through that alone at sixteen.

  At some home for pregnant teenagers.” She shook her head. “I wish I’d known. If only to hug you and tell you everything would be okay.”

  Ivy was silent for a moment. “I didn’t think you HAUNTING OLIV IA

  243

  had a care in the world, Olivia. Back then, I thought you were one of the golden people, gorgeous, rich, perfect. Even that next summer, when you came back to Blueberry for the last time, I had no idea you’d been through something like that.”

  “I guess I learned to hide my emotions,” Olivia said. “We all did, huh?”

  “The three of us never got to know each other well enough to see past all that,” Ivy said.

  Amanda sipped her coffee. “Well, hopefully now, that’ll change.”

  Ivy stood up, moved over to the window, and looked out onto the snowy beach. “How could he have let you think your baby died?” She turned toward Olivia. “How could he possibly do that? And then hand an infant over to a seventeen-year-old boy with no family? What the hell was he thinking?”

  “Sounds like it worked out just fine,” Amanda pointed out. “Zach rose to the challenge and then some.”

  Olivia nodded. “He was an amazing seventeen-year-old. Of course, our father dismissed him as a worthless townie when he found out I was seeing him and forbade me to date him.” She thought about what Camilla had said. “A friend of mine thinks William entrusted Zach with the baby because William wanted me to be able to reunite with both of them one day. What do you think of that?”

  “One day seemed to mean William’s death, though,” Ivy said. “What if he lived another ten, twenty, or thirty years? Would he have kept you from your child forever?”

  Huh. Olivia hadn’t thought of that.

  244

  Janelle Taylor

  “As if we could ever begin to understand the workings of that man’s mind,” Amanda said.

  “And William sent birthday and Christmas cards in your name to Kayla,” Ivy mar veled. “Unbelievable. I can’t decide whether that gives him points or not.”

  Olivia nodded. “I know what you mean. Ever ything is twisted.”

  Ivy sat back down. “Well, from what you said, your relationship with Kayla sounds like it’s off to a wonderful start.”

  “It is,” Olivia said. “She’s so thirteen, though.”

  Ivy and Amanda laughed.

  “Okay, enough about me,” Olivia said. “I want to hear about the two of you. Did you bring me pictures of my gorgeous nephew?” she asked Amanda.

  Amanda smiled and pulled a manila envelope from her purse. “Of course!”

  “Declan wants us to have a baby right away,” Ivy said, as the sisters looked at the pictures of adorable Tommy. “I think I want to wait a few years, though.”

  “He wants to start a family right away even though he’s still a student?” Amanda asked. “That’s brave.”

  “Yeah, because he’ll be in school all day,” Ivy said, smiling. “He has an entire year to go on his M.B.A.”

  She stood up again and moved back to the window and stared up at the sky, her expression troubled.

  “Ivy?” Olivia asked. “You okay?”

  “I’m a little nervous about what’s in my letter,” she said. “I’ll receive it on March twentieth. And I have to open it on March twentieth. But that’s my wedding day. So do I open it before I say ‘I do’ or after?”

  Olivia had learned at the reading of the will that William didn’t approve of Declan. The good-looking HAUNTING OLIV IA

  245

  son of one of Ivy’s mother’s friends, Declan used to work for William’s corporation, then applied to business school.

  “Did he work for William?” Amanda asked.

  “Directly?”

  “No,” Ivy said. “William was just a figurehead for the last couple of years. So he wasn’t even really involved in the day to day. According to Declan, William didn’t think a student was worthy of his daughter. I don’t know what he could possibly have so against him. All William would ever say about the subject was that he didn’t like Declan and that I was making a big mistake by marrying him.”

  “He wouldn’t elaborate?” Amanda asked. “How could he say you were making a big mistake but not say why? ”

  Ivy shrugged. “My mom thinks William is just trying to control me. So does Declan. And I’m so conditioned to not give a flying fig what William thinks. But it bothers me.”

  “Because you think William knew something about Declan?” Olivia asked.

  “I guess so,” Ivy said. “But what? If he knew Declan to be a womanizer, say, wouldn’t he just tell me? Or if he was an embezzler or whatever. Why not just tell me what his big gripe was? Why keep it secret?”

  “Until your wedding day, too,” Olivia said. “If he’s going to reveal his problem with Declan in the letter you’ll receive on March twentieth, wouldn’t he specify you had to open it at the crack of dawn?

  Before you married him?”

  Ivy ran a hand through her short auburn hair.

  “That’s what I don’t get. What I can’t figure out. It’s as though it doesn’t matter to William whether I go 246

  Janelle Taylor

  through with the wedding or not. My mom thinks he’s up to something. But I can’t imagine what. I’m sure I’m inheriting the inn he owns in New Jersey.

  That’s the only other property he does own. There’ll be a bunch of silly rules for me to follow for a month, just like he put you two through.”

  “I’m just grateful my letter didn’t stipulate that I had to spend the thirty days in the cottage,” Olivia said. “I can’t imagine ever spending another night there.”

  “I’m so worried about what’s going on here,” Ivy said. “Are you sure you and Kayla will be safe?”

  “I’m not sure,” Olivia said honestly. “And I don’t know what’s going to happen when the thirty days are up. There are two weeks left to go.”

  “You mean with Zach?” Amanda asked.

  Olivia nodded. “Kayla is my daughter. So I’m going to make my home wherever she is. I just don’t know if that will mean in her home. I don’t know how Zach feels or what he wants.”

  “How do you feel?” Ivy asked.

  “I love him so much,” Olivia said. “I want us to be a family more than anything.”

  “Maybe you should tell him that,” Amanda said.

  Olivia closed her eyes and thought of him, how he came to her every night now. How they made love with so much passion. It was so hard to tell how Zach felt. He was sexually attracted to her, that she knew. And she was his child’s mother. So there was a complex emotional core between them on that level alone.

  But did Zach love her? That she didn’t know.

  Chapter 21

>   When Zach and Olivia arrived at Johanna’s shop at eight o’clock the next morning, the door was unlocked, but Johanna was nowhere to be found.

  “Johanna?” Olivia called out.

  No answer.

  Zach tapped Olivia’s arm and pointed under the curtain of a fitting room. He’d know those three-inch-high red suede boots anywhere. And that over-powering perfume.

  “You two are glued at the hip,” came a familiar voice from the fitting room. “Someone ought to separate you with a machete or something.”

  Ah. All the better that Marnie was here and making vicious comments. He had a small recorder in his pocket. His plan had been to get Johanna talking again on her own turf. But perhaps he’d get the queenpin to incriminate herself.

  Olivia shot him an uneasy glance, and he squeezed her hand.

  Marnie came out of the fitting room, wearing her usual tight jeans—and a black lace push-up bra.

  248

  Janelle Taylor

  “Zach, give me a man’s opinion, will you? Do you prefer this color on me, or this color?” she asked, holding a white and then a black sweater to her chest.

  “I prefer appropriate on you,” Zach said.

  Marnie laughed.

  “I heard that Don withdrew from judging the Inner-Beauty Pageant,” Zach said. “I don’t think you’ll be able to seduce Pearl, so the pageant should be fair from here on in.”

  Marnie’s smile faded.

  “Johanna, I have my receipts for you,” Olivia called out. “Are you here?”

  “Johanna’s not feeling well,” Marnie said. “I promised her I’d handle the collection of your receipts and the signing of the clipboard. We are cousins, after all. It’s the least I can do.”

  Zach stared at her, his gut twisting. “Maybe we’ll stop by her house. Keep things on the up-and-up—

  and bring her some hot soup. Nasty cold?”

  Marnie’s wheels were spinning. “Nasty bruise, actually. Johanna’s a bit of a klutz. Walked right into a door.”

  “Really,” Zach said. “I’d think anyone who could walk on those four-inch heels she favors would be pretty steady on her feet.”

  “Well, that shows you what you know, Zach,”

  Marnie said. She turned to Olivia. “You can leave your receipts on the counter. The sign-in sheet is there too. Until Johanna’s on her feet again, I’ll be minding her business,” she added pointedly.