Right outside,I type back.Talking with Paul. But don’t book rooms.
As soon as I send off the text, I show the screen to Jack. He has to lift his glasses to read it, and his eyes quickly brighten. “Yes?”
Nodding, I pocket the phone, slip my fingers through his and draw him along with me. Paul meets us at the top of the stairs. He studies first Jack, then me.
“I told him,” I say quietly. There’s no need to elaborate. The only subject between us, really, is the fact of who Paul is. “Jack is the only one who knew my doubts all these years.”
“You’re that close?” Paul asks, his gaze drifting between us again.
I can’t read his expression—don’t know if he approves or disapproves and why either should matter. Feeling a thread of my earlier pique, I raise my chin in defiance, but the effect is diluted when the sea breeze whips my hair across my mouth. Gathering it in my free hand, I hold it to my neck.
Before I can speak, Jack says in a typically male, typically Jack declaration, “We’re that close. We share everything.” In a gesture of directness, he shifts his sunglasses to the top of his head.
“Including things about Elizabeth,” I add, lest Paul think I’m just along for the ride. Everything about that night concerns me, too. If Jack’s focus is his mother, mine is Tom. With him gone, it’s now about memory. I want to correct whatever parts of that may be wrong. “There’s too much we don’t know. You handled her business affairs. You have answers we need.”
Paul looks like he’s about to object. I’m sure he’d rather be talking with me alone, perhaps explaining himself more or sharing what he wants our future to be. Hell, he may be feeling like my asking him about Elizabeth at this particular time is emotional extortion. But he does owe me.
Jack gets it going. “We know my mother’s business was on the verge of collapse. We know she had a falling out with her brother. Tom rambled about a man named Doe, likely Ronald Doe, the lawyer in Albany who handled her family trust. Doe is dead, or I’d be asking him these questions. My mother was the executor of the estate. I’ve searched her files for information connecting these things, but there’s nothing.”
“Tom talked about robbing Peter to pay Paul,” I say. “You’re the Paul. The Peter is Elizabeth’s brother, but he won’t talk with Jack. Nor will anyone else in the family.”
“Except his granddaughter,” Jack puts in. “She’s here in town for the summer. You’ve probably seen her? Looks like my mother?”
Paul is bemused. “The blonde at the funeral today? I assumed it was coincidence.”
“No. She’s working at Anne’s for the summer,” Jack says and drops the heavy part. “Her college major was investigative journalism.”
His brows knit. “Doing research? For a book, an article, anindictment?”
“We don’t know. But she can’t have gotten far if she hasn’t talked with you. You’re the one with the answers.”
Paul turns to me. “Is this why you called Sunday?”
I feel a moment’s guilt for having an ulterior motive, but the bigger picture has taken over. This isn’t about my parenthood. It’s about a broader set of events that affect us all.
“When we realized you were the Paul in ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul,’ yes, I called.” But I soften as I remember that call. “Hearing your voice brought back other things. Good things. You were always a comfortable part of our family. And you were always nice to my mom.”
A corner of his mouth quirks at the compliment.
Pressing the advantage, I say, “Elizabeth’s business meant everything to her. If she knew it was failing, what did she do?”
I’m not sure if there is an expiration date for attorney-client privilege. But Paul has to be realizing that with Dad now dead, Mom and Elizabeth both gone, and Jack and I being next of kin, secrecy is overkill.
Glancing around, he spots the long bench at the spot where the Sabathian drive forks from the circle. It is half-hidden by rangy junipers whose blue-green hue camouflages the weathered wood. A gnarled oak rises behind, offering shade.
Heading there, he waves us along, but when we reach it, he doesn’t sit. Nor does Jack. I do. Crossing my legs, I tuck my still-blowing hair under the shoulder of my black dress. Then I sit back in silent expectation.
After a minute, Paul cedes. “There was money taken—borrowed,” he adds with air quotes and eyes Jack, “from her family estate.”
“Did you advise that?” he asks.
“No. It was done before I learned of it. Your mother wasn’t proud of the company’s decline. She was hoping money from the estate would shore it up and that she could repay it with no one the wiser.” He stops short.
Jack finishes. “Only it didn’t pick up.”
“No.” Paul’s voice gentles. This is Jack’s mother he’s talking about, and Paul Schuster is nothing if not kind. “She truly did think of what she borrowed as a loan, but when the business continued to tank, she was in trouble.”
“And you suggested… what?” Jack asks in annoyance.
