Identity, page 8
Emptied out, she turned off the taps, put on her pajamas.
As she’d been taught, she hung her towel to dry before going into her nighttime routine.
Then she sat on the side of the bed, listening to the wind, the settling of the house.
A house where she lived, had this lovely, lovely room, because of the generosity of two women who loved her.
“What now?” she wondered. “What do I do now? Where do I start?”
Tomorrow, she told herself as she climbed under the crisp sheets, the fluffy duvet. She’d figure it out tomorrow. Or the day after that.
Or, she thought, and turned off the light, shut her eyes.
And fell into sleep like a stone into a river.
Chapter Six
She woke disoriented, and for a moment thought she dreamed. The pretty room with all the soothing blues, the way the light slid through the windows, all seemed so strange and unfamiliar.
Then she remembered and had to fight the deep desire to just close her eyes, just escape into sleep again.
Not the way, she told herself. Hiding in sleep solved nothing. When she woke, Nina would still be dead, the life she’d built still in ruins.
She needed to move forward—somehow, somewhere. The only choice was to move forward. Move.
She got up, dressed. Out of ingrained habit she made the bed, fluffed the pillows before wandering downstairs.
Olivia sat at the kitchen island, wearing a black sweatshirt. Its white lettering said simply:
i dissent
She sipped from an oversize mug of coffee while she worked a crossword on her tablet.
Morgan pointed at the lettering. “To what?”
“Whatcha got? Let me fix you some coffee. We went for that fancy machine when we redid things around here.”
“I can get it. I’m a bartender—was,” Morgan corrected. “Coffee machines can’t defeat me. I’m sorry I slept so late.”
“After the drive you had, I expected you to sleep longer. How about some breakfast?”
“No, nothing now, thanks. Please don’t fuss over me.”
“Grandmothers are designed to fuss over their grandchildren. It makes us happy. Don’t you want me to be happy?”
“Coffee machines don’t defeat me,” Morgan muttered as beans ground, as coffee streamed into the mug she’d set below, “but grandmothers do.”
“Because we’re so wise, and wisdom hones sneaky. And I see you still take some coffee in your cream and sugar.”
“I thought you’d be in town, at the shop by now.”
“Your mother’s taking the morning shift. She only just left.”
Sipping, nodding, Morgan leaned back against the counter. “Meaning you’re taking shifts keeping an eye on me.”
“Looks that way,” Olivia said easily. “And I asked for this morning because I think it may be easier for you to tell your grandmother what’s in your heart and mind right now than your mother. If I’m wrong—though when am I wrong?—I can switch with Audrey.”
“What’s in my heart and mind.” Morgan closed her eyes. “I lost everything, most vitally my closest friend.” She opened her eyes again. “Nina’s mother told me you wrote her, so did Mom. It meant a lot to her.”
“We only knew Nina through you, but that made her part of the family to us.”
“After Nina … Well, I lost everything else. My savings—gone—my home—someone else’s now. My car, and I know that’s nothing really, but I loved that damn car. My plans, my goals, my pride, my sense of security and self. Poof.” She flicked her fingers in the air. “A year ago, just one year ago, I had everything under control, everything lined up. Now? I’ve got nothing, literally nothing, and I’m living in my grandmother’s house.”
“All right.” Olivia lifted her mug, sipped. “You’re entitled to feel all of that. In fact, in your place, I’d have myself a first-class rage party.”
Not pity party, Morgan noted. No self-pity for Olivia Nash. “I’ve had a few.”
“Good, that’s healthy. You deserve them. You’re entitled to feel all that,” Olivia repeated, “even when you’re wrong.”
“Where am I wrong?”
“You say you have nothing? You have Morgan Nash Albright, damn it, and don’t ever forget it. And this is not your grandmother’s house, this is the Kennedy-Nash family home. I’m giving your grandfather first billing on it.
“Now, you can take as much time as you need to wallow, to sleep late, to rage, to curse whichever deity works best for you. You were victimized, and for a strong, smart woman—and you’re both—that’s devastating as much as it’s a pure pisser. When you’re finished, you’ll figure out what to do next.”
“It is a pisser. It is a pure pisser. Why hasn’t anyone said just that before now?”
“Because no one else is your gram. Haven’t you said it yourself?”
“I felt guilty when I even thought it.” But she didn’t now, she realized, because Gram had said it first. “Everyone felt sorry for me, but—”
“Nobody got pissed for you—or showed it. Trust me, I’m plenty pissed for you. So’s your mother, in her more delicate way. I’d like to kick that bastard’s balls blue before I twist his dick off at the root.”
With a shrug, Olivia drank more coffee. “But that’s just not-so-delicate me.”
“I can’t say exactly why,” Morgan said after a moment, “but that really helps.”
“Good.”
“I have to get a job.”
“There’s no ‘have to’ right now. Sit down, I’m making you an omelet.”
“Gram—”
“Nobody turns down one of my omelets.” Olivia rose. “Now sit. I’m going to ask you for a favor.”
“What?”
“Take two weeks. Sleep, eat, read, watch movies, take walks, build a snowman, whatever.” She got out eggs, cheese, fresh spinach. “The stress of this past year shows, baby of my baby. It shows.”
Hard to argue that, Morgan thought as she sat. She saw it every time she looked in the mirror.
“You take some time. If you need something practical to do, fine. Come into the shop and we’ll put you to work a few hours a week. Otherwise, it’s time to catch up with yourself.”
“I need to earn a living.”
“You do, of course, and you will. Two weeks out of your life won’t change that. And your mother and I want some time with you. I think—and again, when am I wrong?—you need time with us.”
Morgan said nothing as Olivia whisked eggs in a bowl while a skillet heated on the stove.
“I feel like such a failure, Gram.”
“You’ll get over that, because you’re not and never have been. You had your world fall away from under you. I know what that’s like. I had mine fall away.”
“When Pa died.”
“Then, but we had a lifetime together, and all those memories. I can pick one out, like chocolates from a box, and every one has its own flavor. But a long time ago. I lost a child.”
“What?” Morgan shot up straight. “When? I never heard—”
“Your mother was barely two, so she doesn’t remember. I never talked to her about it until after Steve died.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“Steve and I built this house, this big, wonderful house, and planned to fill it with children. We wanted at least four, and when Audrey came along, we were so happy. Our beautiful girl, our first child. It was all so easy, really. And then, right on schedule, we had another coming.”
She poured eggs in the skillet, added the cheese, the spinach. “I was eight months along. We were finishing the nursery, arguing over names, all the things you do. And something went wrong. Everything went wrong. I lost the baby and any chance to have another. A little boy. He never had a chance to take his first breath.”
“Oh, Gram.”
“With the grief—I know what Nina’s mother feels because I felt it—but with the grief, I felt a failure. I lost my child and there would never be another.”
She flipped the omelet with the panache of a French chef.
“We got through it, but it was hard. It was brutal. We had our beautiful daughter. Steve had his work. I started throwing pots.” She laughed at that. “I was absolutely terrible at it, and never got better. I’m a businesswoman and no artist, but trying to be gave me a deep respect and admiration for artists, craftspeople. So it gave me a new direction.”
“The lopsided green cup he kept pencils in on the desk in his study,” Morgan remembered. “He told me once you made that in the long ago.”
“It was supposed to be a vase.” Olivia shook her head. “That man loved me. ‘Sell the stuff, Livvy,’ he said to me. ‘You know what’s good and you know how to sell. You just need a place to sell it.’”
“Crafty Arts was his idea?”
“Another chocolate from the box. So I gave up making bad pottery, and we started the shop, just a tiny place at first. But it grew, and so did Audrey. And I had a world again. A different one than I’d always planned, but a good world.”
She set the plated omelet in front of Morgan. “You’ll make new plans, build a new world. Now eat.”
“Thanks. Thanks for telling me. Gram? Could I have that cup? The lopsided green cup? It’ll remind me of him, and you, and finding new directions.”
Olivia came around the island, pressed a kiss to Morgan’s temple. Held on an extra minute.
“Of course you can. Now, you keep this in your busy mind. The man who did all this? He’ll pay, one way or the other, whether or not you ever know about it, he’ll pay. Karma’s not just a bitch, she’s a righteous bitch. And he won’t break you, because you won’t let him.
“Two weeks,” she added.
“Two weeks,” Morgan agreed. “I love you, Gram.”
“Of course you do. I love you right back. Now eat.”
* * *
So she ate, and she slept. She took walks and sat by the fire with a book. By the third day, she wondered how much longer she could keep it up without losing her mind.
Her grandmother might request two weeks, but Morgan’s wiring demanded busy. On day three, with both Olivia and Audrey at work, she sat down at the secondhand laptop, opened the spreadsheet she’d created months before.
Reality hadn’t changed since the last time she’d gone over it. Broke still equaled broke. But this time she worked on projections. No question she could live in the pretty blue room as long as she wanted or needed, rent free. But wiring also required she pull her weight.
She could take over some household tasks, but her ladies already had a weekly cleaning crew, and the trio of women who tended the rambling old Tudor had done so for a dozen years.
If she took over cleaning, she put people out of a job.
Unacceptable.
Laundry—the cleaning trio already dealt with most of that.
She could do the marketing—something—but she couldn’t subject the ladies to her cooking unless she got a lot better at it.
Marketing, doing the dishes after meals? That should keep her busy for about three hours a week, which didn’t begin to fill the hole.
She needed work. A job. Needed to earn an income.
To start on that? Drive into town, look around, visit the shop. And no, she wouldn’t work there. It steered much too close to living rent free.
She put on makeup, and since she hadn’t indulged in a professional cut and style in months, tried a few snips here and there.
She definitely wouldn’t get a job at a salon, but it wasn’t terrible.
She dressed in something other than sweats. Winter-weight leggings, boots, a red sweater over a thermal shirt. Before she could change her mind and just retreat to her room, again, she dragged on her coat, wool cap, scarf, and stepped out into the frigid, unrelenting grip of winter.
And prayed Nina’s car started.
It coughed a little, wheezed a little more, but turned over.
In under ten minutes she broke through the snow-coated trees, crossed the narrow bridge over the frozen whip of river, and turned onto High Street.
Westridge ranked, she supposed, somewhere between big town and small city. Picturesque, certainly, especially in its winter coat. It drew tourists, she knew, in every season. Winter sports, summer sports, fall foliage, spring hikes. Hunting, fishing, birding.
The Resort at Westridge, with its classy cabins and classier hotel suites, drew the well-heeled into the area, offering all those activities along with exceptional food, an admirable wine cellar, two bars—a very casual lodge bar, and the more upscale glass-walled bar with a four-sided stone fireplace that catered to après ski, or après whatever the guests wished.
The town offered a banquet of restaurants, from diner style to five-star fancy, shops, boutiques, sporting goods, Vermont-flavored souvenirs, art galleries, and more.
Many of those nestled together on High Street, including her grandmother’s Crafty Arts. Or, as the sign read now, Morgan noted, Crafty Arts and Wine Café.
Even this late in the winter season and before the spring thaw, it … well, it nearly bustled, she admitted. Since she really wasn’t familiar with the geography, she had to hunt for parking. She remembered a small lot behind Crafty Arts but didn’t know how to navigate around the hilly roads and busy intersections to find it.
Still, street parking—when she found it—offered her a chance to check out the main commercial areas and possible opportunities.
Restaurants, retail, cafés, a bakery, an upscale bar. She could wait tables if she had to, but the bar hit top of her list. On side streets, she spotted a gallery, low-rise apartments, more shops, a doctor’s office, a wineshop—with a small wine bar. Next on her list.
On a less blustery day, she promised herself, she’d explore farther. But for now, she stopped in front of Crafty Arts and Wine Café.
Someone, she thought, had done a crafty and arty job on the display window. Tables and stands of varying heights held blown glass art arranged with wooden bowls, pottery. A soft gray throw draped over the back of a rocking chair.
Inside she found warmth, not just in the air, but the light, in the gleam of the wood floors. Paintings covered the walls. Old cabinets displayed handcrafted jewelry and small pieces of pottery, silverwork, copper. Another highlighted candles. Open shelves sparkled with blown glass.
A long antique bookcase transformed into the checkout counter where a woman chattered away with a customer while she wrapped up purchases. Behind her, a glorious stained glass peacock spread its tail.
The counterwoman glanced up, smiled. “Can I help you find anything?”
“Not yet, thanks. Just taking it in.”
She wandered on. They’d done so much, she realized, since she’d last been in. Wood or ironwork tables held more pottery, lamps, cutting boards, platters.
She walked upstairs. If memory served, the second floor had once been used as storage and her grandmother’s office. No more. Here she found textiles. Handcrafted scarves, gloves, hats, tablecloths, and runners.
Handmade soaps and lotions, more furniture, more art.
It occurred to her if she’d walked into this shop and still had disposable income, she’d never have walked out empty-handed.
When she walked down, she passed a couple heading up, and found the counter clerk just finishing up with another customer.
“Doing okay?”
“Yes. Sorry, I should’ve said, but you were busy. I’m Olivia’s granddaughter.”
“You’re Morgan! Oh my goodness.” Reaching out, she grabbed both of Morgan’s hands. “I went to high school with your mother! It’s so nice to meet you. I’m Sue Newton.”
“It’s nice to meet you, too.”
“They’re in the café—opening this Saturday. Some finishing touches going in. You go right on over. It’s going to be great.”
A sheet of plastic hung over the wide case opening. She pushed through into the light and bright. They’d hung plastic over the wide front window, something she found clever.
Keep people guessing until the big reveal.
She judged it would be big.
They’d carried the same wood flooring through for flow from space to space. The cream walls held more art—never miss a chance for a sale. They’d gone dark and moody on the millwork for contrast, and it worked.
The bar matched the millwork with a countertop of granite that married the cream with streaks of the dark. They’d scattered low tops, high tops, four tops, a few booths in deep blue leather.
And—not to miss a trick—had a small retail section of wine toppers, glasses, corkscrews, mugs, teacups, coffee and tea accessories.
They’d coffered the ceiling, adding the classy and the cozy.
Because she couldn’t help herself, she walked behind the bar.
Shelves, a fridge, an ice maker, a wine cooler, a speed rack, a section for tools, another for bar mops. She pulled out a leather-bound menu and found her eyebrows rising up at the extent of the selection.
Before she could put it back and step out, her ladies came out from the back.
“It’s going to work,” Audrey was saying, then spotted Morgan. “What a surprise! What do you think?” She spread her arms.
“I think I’m stunned. It’s amazing, everything. You changed the upstairs next door, and it’s wonderful. And this? It’s beautiful. Fancy but not fussy. Efficient but not staid.”
“Still needs a few touches, but we’ll be ready for Saturday.” Olivia gestured. “Come look at the kitchen. We’re offering baked goods, and that meant a damn commercial kitchen. But it’ll be worth it.”
She walked through the swinging door.
It shined, as the back of the house should. Stainless steel gleamed; steel shelves held cookware and tools. The big commercial hood over a six-burner stove top, the walk-in refrigerator said professional and impressive. Dishwasher, sink, mop sink, and the biggest, shiniest mixer she’d ever seen added more of the same.
“You’ve got it all. A really good use of the space.”
“And it passed final inspection.” Audrey swiped a hand over her forehead. Then bounced a little on her toes so her shiny tail of blond swung.
