The Final Victim, page 11
Then again, Silas's will was straightforward; no surprises there. He left everything to Betsy, his fourth wife, who spent more time fluttering around Savannah than she did at Silas's bedside during his last months on earth, after the stroke that paralyzed just about every function but his speech. As Betsy so eloquently phrased it, "I've always been a little squeamish. Those hospice nurses are much better at this kind of thing than I am."
If Tyler had any anxieties about the prospect of reading Silas's will, they were based on the fear that Betsy might put her hand on his thigh beneath the table, as she was reputedly inclined to do even when her husband was alive.
It didn't happen. The will was read without a hitch- and Betsy went on to get rehitched just six months later, to a man her own age-or perhaps a decade younger. As Gilbert dryly stated at the time, he probably needed someone to pay his college tuition.
I miss you already, Gilbert.
And you, too, Silas.
This world seems to get lonelier with every passing week.
Tyler is acutely aware of his status as a widower himself, and as sole survivor of a lifelong threesome referred to back in their boarding school days as the Telfair Trio. He sinks into his leather swivel chair behind the mahogany desk at which two previous generations of Hawthornes practiced law.
The days of standing weekly golf games and lunches at the club with Silas and Gilbert were long gone well before his friends died. But despite having drifted with old age from their social and recreational rituals, the bond forged four score-give or take a year or two- ago, remained.
The trio staged some risky schoolboy pranks and escapades in their days at Telfair Academy-always knowing they had each other's backs.
That loyalty-that willingness to cover for each other, even if it meant lying to an authority figure, or a spouse- lingered into adulthood. They knew each other's deepest and, in some cases, darkest secrets.
Thanks to Silas and Gilbert, Tyler's beloved Marjorie went to her deathbed never knowing of his foolish, youthful indiscretions.
And thanks to Silas and Tyler putting their own careers as doctor and lawyer on the line, Gilbert's family fortune remains intact-and, perhaps even more importantly, the Remington name untarnished.
Perhaps it was the Telfair Trio's final escapade, that ultimate test of their allegiance, that pushed them all too far. After that, things were never quite the same. On the surface, yes. But deep down, Tyler suspects, guilt had finally caught up with all three of them.
Perhaps Gilbert most of all.
But it all happened years ago. Another lifetime, it seems.
Tyler drums his fingertips on the green blotter and turns a nervous eye toward the swinging pendulum of the wall clock opposite.
In about five minutes, Gilbert Remington II's descendants are going to walk through that door, fully anticipating that they will walk back out set for life, millionaires many times over.
One won't be disappointed.
* * *
"Remember, you need to be ready when I come back here to get you." Parked at the curb in front of Casey's house on Bull Street in Savannah's historic district, Mom taps the steering wheel of her white Lexus SUV with both hands for emphasis.
Lianna almost wishes old Stephen had driven her into town instead of her mother. But the chauffeur has gone to visit his daughter in Atlanta for a few weeks, and Great-Grandaddy's shiny black car sits unused in the carriage house until he gets back.
"I'm going to call your cell phone when I'm on my way," Mom goes on, "so you'll have plenty of warning, and I swear, if you're not ready "
"I will be," Lianna says, wishing her mother would stop talking to her, and frowning over at her in the passenger's seat, as if she's a naughty little girl. It's enough to make her add, snippily, "Just don't call and say you're coming back a half hour from now and expect me to be happy to see you."
"Don't use that tone with me." Mom's violet eyes darken ominously.
Lianna can't help but notice, jealously, that her mother is strikingly pretty even when she's angry. It isn't fair. Why can't Mom look like a regular person, the way her friends' mothers do? Or, if she has to be so beautiful, at least Lianna could have inherited her looks.
Lianna apparently resembles not her father, with his dark good looks, but his side of the family, though she doesn't know firsthand. Her paternal grandparents died long before she was born, and she hasn't seen her father's only sister in years. For that matter, she doesn't see a whole lot of Dad himself-but only because Mom won't let her. That's what he says, and Lianna believes it wholeheartedly.
Mom wasn't even nice to Daddy at the funeral, after he drove all that way to offer his condolences.
Too bad that he couldn't stay longer or that Lianna couldn't go home with him. He said his apartment is too small, but he's working on getting a bigger one, so she can start spending every other weekend with him, the way she's supposed to-and never has.
"You heard what I said, Lianna." Mom is still glaring at her. "When I get back, you'll be ready to come home with me."
"Yeah, well… Oakgate isn't home. Just so you know. In case you forgot."
Shut up, Lianna tells herself. Why are you making things difficult? Why don't you just get out of the stupid car before she decides to take you with her to the stupid lawyer's office?
Why?
Who the heck knows?
She just can't seem to help herself. Lately, whenever she's talking to her mother, she opens her mouth and harsh, spiteful things fall out of it To her surprise, her mother doesn't have an angry retort. This time, anyway.
"I know Oakgate isn't home, Lianna," Mom says, sounding almost sympathetic. "It really won't be much longer till we come back to Savannah. I promise."
Lianna is tempted to point out that the new house in Savannah isn't home, either. Not to her. No place feels like home to her anymore.
Poor, poor child of divorce, she tells herself-mockingly, yet the words sting.
Struck by a sudden, fierce longing for her father, she wishes she had told Mom earlier that before he left the funeral reception last week, he promised to visit next weekend… and that Lianna wants to stay with him while he's here. He always stays at the same place: the Shark's Tooth Inn on the southernmost tip of the island.
She figures he won't mind having her stay there, too. Especially since that will mean he won't have to keep dealing with Mom and her rules.
Now isn't the time for Lianna to bring it up to her mother, but she will, first chance she gets.
Right, and Mom will have that tight-lipped expression she gets every time Lianna brings up her dad.
Why does Mom hate him so much? Why can't she see that her nasty attitude keeps her ex-husband away, not just from her-which is how she wants it-but from his daughter as well?
It isn't fair.
I need him. He's my dad.
Lianna turns to look out the car window at the dense, graying sky beyond the rooftops. Raindrops threaten to fall any second now, as do her own tears.
"Listen, go have fun with your friend," her mother tells her unexpectedly, and leans over to peck her on the cheek.
Lianna doesn't mean to brush away the kiss as if it was a pesky fly.
But she does. She can't help herself.
The instant hurt in Mom's expression sends Lianna scrambling for the door handle.
As luck would have it, Tyler happened to be recuperating in the hospital from a car accident when Gilbert Remington changed his will last winter. His grand-nephew, Jameson, a new partner in the firm, handled it in his absence.
By the time Tyler realized what had happened, the new will was completed and signed.
At that point, it wasn't necessarily Tyler's place to question a client's decision to all but disinherit two of his three heirs. He did so anyway, in part because Gilbert was a close friend; but mostly because Gilbert was always adamant that his estate be divided equally among the remaining Remingtons, regardless of his feelings for them.
Something drastic must have happened to change his mind. Tyler couldn't deny being curious about a possible rift in Savannah's most prominent family.
So he picked up the phone and called.
He fully expected Gilbert to brush him off in his usual brusque manner, but his friend seemed oddly subdued as they exchanged initial niceties that day.
When Tyler brought up the will, he drawled, "I knew I'd be hearing from you about it, Tyler. If you didn't croak, that is."
Ah, that zinger was more like the cantankerous old SOB.
"No, I'm alive and well-for the time being, anyway, according to my doctor. And thank you for the fruit basket." A personal note, let alone a visit, would have been nicer, but Gilbert never was the warm-fuzzy type. 1 don't plan on going anywhere anytime soon," Tyler went on, "and I'm sure you don't either, Gilbert."
No reply.
"But when you do… I see that you're essentially leaving everything to-"
"Don't question me, Tyler. You didn't give me grief when I eliminated Xavy's wife after he passed away."
"No," Tyler told him, "but that was different, Gilbert."
"How?"
"This involves your own flesh and blood."
It was no secret that Gilbert wasn't particularly fond of his daughter-in-law Susan. He never did take kindly to 'Yankees," and he merely tolerated her from the moment his son brought her home.
Not that he ever had much use for his other daughter- I in-law, a fragile, petulant Southern belle who grew up on Achoco Island. He'd probably have gone to the trouble to write out Connie June as well, if she hadn't already been terminally ill at that point.
In fact, Tyler recalls that at the time he was touched I by Gilbert's concern over her health, particularly toward the end. Gilbert flew in specialists to treat her and when that failed, hired the best private hospice nurses his money could buy. He arranged for fresh flower arrangements to be delivered daily to her bedside, and ordered in bulk any foods she could manage to keep down.
As Tyler saw it then, the overly solicitous behavior was most likely in deference to Connie June's daughter.
Either that, or in his twilight years the old man was starting to soften… a suggestion he'd have taken as an accusation, not a compliment, should Tyler ever have brought it up.
Which he wouldn't.
Even if he hadn't eventually learned the real, and shocking, reason for Gilbert's solicitous behavior toward Connie June, the final change Gilbert made to his will would certainly have ultimately proven he wasn't softening with age.
Rather, it would seem to indicate the opposite. "You know it's my job as your attorney to ensure that you were of sound mind and body when you made these latest changes," Tyler told Gilbert.
"Your nephew must have decided that I was, because he didn't have a problem with the new will when he drew it up."
"He doesn't know you the way I do."
Gilbert snorted at that.
As if to say, You don't know me at all, Tyler.
Still…
"Why didn't you wait for me to come back before you made the changes?"
"At our age, Tyler, who has time to wait?"
"You could at least have consulted me."
"You were lying in a hospital bed." Gilbert's tone was surprisingly subdued. "How could I do that to you?"
"What did your family do to piss you off, might I ask?"
"You might," Gilbert shot back, his lapse into kindly consideration unsurprisingly temporary, "but I don't have to answer, you nosy son of a bitch."
It was hardly the first time in Tyler's life that Gilbert had called him that-usually with utmost affection. But this time, it was hardly a term of endearment.
What on earth could have happened? Obviously, something earth-shattering enough to cause Gilbert to set aside his typically pragmatic approach to family finance.
"You have to know all hell is going to break loose when your family finds out what you've done."
"I won't be there to see it," was Gilbert's succinct response.
"No, but I will."
"Look on the bright side, Tyler. Maybe you'll get lucky and check out after I do."
"I doubt that. I've always thought you were going to live forever," he replied, only half-kidding.
"Then neither of us has anything to worry about, do we?"
Maybe you don't, Tyler thinks now, gazing at the legal document waiting on his desk. But I most certainly do.
The will is bound to be messily contested.
What the hell was Gilbert thinking?
* * *
The Magnolia Clinic is conveniently located in the shadows of Highway 16, just off the exit ramp. Mimi has no problem finding it, just as Dr. Redmond's nurse promised when she called this morning to summon them.
Everything about this place is depressing, from the unadorned, yellow-brick facade to the rusty chain-link and barbed wire fence that rings the parking lot. There is nary a magnolia in sight. Most of the cars here, including those with MD license plates, are older domestic models, many in some form of disrepair, mute testimony to the economic level of clientele and staff.
But this is where the Johnstons have landed, courtesy of a nonexistent insurance plan and a virtually empty bank account.
"I'm going to have to park pretty far away from the door. Do you want me to go get a wheelchair?" she asks Jed, when they find themselves circling the lot a second time.
"No. I'll walk."
She opens her mouth to protest, but thinks better of it. He hates being treated like an invalid. He's been through enough of that lately, and who knows what lies ahead?
After collapsing at work and being rushed to Candler General's ER with unbearable stomach pain, poor Jed spent a miserable week in a hospital bed. He was hooked up to an IV, injected and scanned and drained of various fluids as gastroenterology specialists attempted to determine the cause of his illness.
Now, presumably, they know.
And it's news that needs to be delivered in person.
Which means it can't be good.
This is just like what happened with Daddy…
