The Heiress(70)

Fire.

My heart is in my mouth, my hands choking the steering wheel, and the back tires slide as I slam on the gas, climbing higher and higher as the sky gets brighter and the thick smell of smoke starts seeping into the car.

The gates are open, and I tear through them so fast that I hear roots scraping the undercarriage, a distant metallic thunk that can’t be good, but I don’t care because now I’m rounding the last bend, then I slam on the brakes as I raise my hand against the glare.

Ashby House is burning.

Every inch of it is lit up with white-hot flames. The fire engine I now see at the side of the house is blasting water, creating clouds of steam in the night sky. But the steady stream is no match for the blaze.

When I stumble out of the driver’s seat, the heat almost has me reeling back, but I can’t, I have to keep moving toward the house, toward Jules.

“Jules!”

Her name is a harsh scream in my throat, and I call it again and again, eyes frantically searching, but the house is so damn bright, and the few dark figures I see are all in heavy gear.

Firefighters, spraying their hoses, wielding their axes, and I stand there, watching Ashby House burn, imagining Ruby’s portrait inside, those painted eyes somehow intact, watching as flames lick at Jules’s skin, her hair, burning her to ash.

If only you’d been the man I thought you were, Camden. If only you’d picked up that phone.

My knees are weak, and I’m fighting the urge to sink to them when I see white lights off to the other side of the house.

An ambulance, doors flung open, and a figure on a stretcher.

Sitting up. Gesturing toward the house.

Blond hair glowing.

I’m running toward her before I know it, and when she sees me, Jules pulls the oxygen mask off her face. She’s streaked with soot and tears, parts of her hair crisped away, but she’s alive, and already reaching for me.

“Cam!”

I wrap my arms around her, hardly believing it.

“You’re okay,” I say, and one of the EMTs, a redheaded woman I think I went to high school with, gently pushes me back.

“She’s not okay. She’s got a nasty lump on the back of her head, and she’s inhaled a lot of smoke.”

“I’m okay,” Jules argues, then turns to me, insisting again, “I’m okay.”

Her face clouds then, cold fingers tangling with mine. “But Cam … Ben was in there. I don’t know about Libby, but…” Her voice breaks, a sob mixing with a hacking cough.

She tries, she really does.

And it’s good, I have to give it to her. Good enough to fool anyone else. My girl wasn’t a theater major for nothing.

But she can’t hide from me.

Maybe one day she’ll tell me the truth.

Maybe not.

Maybe she’ll wait until she’s in her seventies, and then she’ll write me a long stack of letters, letters that are actually for me this time.

That’s fine.

For now, I just hold her hand in mine and together we watch the McTavishes burn.





From the Desk of Ruby A. McTavish

March 31, 2013

Surprise! Another letter.

I’m sure you thought I was done after the last one. Honestly, so did I. I’d given you everything, darling, so what else was there to say?

But then I got your reply—now thrown in the fire, just as you asked, how very clandestine we’re being!—and, since I have some time tonight, I thought I’d jot one final missive.

Besides, I have some questions for you now, questions I somehow neglected when we met.

Have you always been this clever? It’s just that cleverness does not seem to run in the family, no offense. (And how could I offend, given that it’s my family, too? Insulting your bloodline is insulting mine, let’s not forget, darling.)

Although, I suppose my father/your great-grandfather had a certain kind of low cunning. You have to be pretty ruthless to sell your toddler, after all. But then my mother, your great-grandmother, had the integrity to burn thousands of dollars when she could barely keep a roof over her head.

Do those two impulses balance out in you?

In any case, you were right to contact me. I had assumed your grandmother threw my card away back in 1985, and that I’d never hear from any of you again.

Imagine my delight when I got your message!

Well, I wasn’t completely delighted. I do wish you’d been a little nicer, and a little less … threatening, let’s say, but still, a bit of intrigue always livens up one’s day.

I don’t think I told you the night we met, but you were very good in that play. I’ve seen Arsenic and Old Lace many times—it was one of Andrew’s favorites—and I did not have especially high hopes for a community college production in Gainesville, Florida, and yet there you were, impeccable as Elaine. Far better than the boy playing Mortimer Brewster, I’m afraid.

But then, I’m sure you already knew that. You strike me as a girl who knows her worth.

To be honest, I’m not sure I fully believed I was a Darnell until I met you. Your grandmother certainly resembled me physically, but we were miles apart spiritually. You, though, Miss Caity.

You’re a girl after my own heart.

As I told you in that horrible diner you insisted we go to, it’s always been my dearest wish to somehow repay the Darnell family for their loss. Not that anyone ever could replace such a precious thing as a child, but I’ve longed to make amends for some time.