Chapter 7
Seven
CALEB
“ V ictoria, can you bring me the files for the Blackwater estate? I want everything: property tax records, payroll, employee pension payouts, back through ten years.”
“You want me to request copies through your mother’s office?”
“My mother’s office? No, I want the original files on everything.
” Mom retained a separate business office for her own personal interests and private accounts apart from the family holdings.
I’d never questioned it before because my father set it all up for her, and it was basically keeping with the status quo after he died.
I’d been so overwhelmed since I’d had to step up to take over the bulk of Dad’s business when he got sick, that I’d not paid attention to what seemed insignificant at the time.
Funny how the passage of time can change that.
But was a historic property that had been in my family for generations insignificant?
It shouldn’t be. My father loved it and I couldn’t imagine him wanting it sold to strangers.
He would have wanted his kids to enjoy it with their young families.
Families. None of us were even married yet, or had families of our own.
But some day we would. My sister, Willow, was the closest in line for kids since she was already engaged.
To a guy who taught history at Brown University, and I’d only met one time.
One time. Dad sure as hell would’ve met him more than once if he were still alive.
Put the family first, Caleb. I decided I needed to get a little more involved with my family.
A pang of regret hit me hard right in the chest as I realized my dad would never know a single grandchild from any of his five children.
What kind of legacy was that to pass down if the family estate was sold off before he was barely cold in his grave?
Christ, my mother was a piece of work. She’d never said a word to me about it.
“I’ll go down and see Myrna in the file room and she can point me in the right direction hopefully. You know ten years is going to be a lot of files, Caleb.”
“I realize that. Box them by year and have Spence help you get them up here to my office. He can line the boxes under the window.”
“And when Myrna wants to know why we’re emptying her file room?” she asked.
“Good point. Just tell Myrna we need them for an internal audit because the property is looking for a buyer. I don’t want my mom to know, okay?”
Victoria nodded once and that was our code for, “Got it, boss,” which was just another reason why she was an excellent PA.
She was all business with no drama, but most of all, I could trust her.
“Victoria,” I called her back as she was almost out the door, “did you—did you know Blackwater was up for sale?”
“Yes.” Her dark blue eyes were full of compassion for me. That feeling a person gets when they understand you are the last to know what is really going on, and feel sorry for you. “My parents mentioned it to me a while back.”
“What did they say?” I needed to know.
“That it was a shame for such a magnificent place as Blackwater to go to people who wouldn’t have the connection to the island.”
“Your parents are right.” Blackwater wasn’t going to go to strangers. I knew that much. It might be sold, though…
To me.
“I also need Spence to get the chopper ready for seven tonight, so set that up with him, please. I’m staying with Lucas this weekend and visiting Blackwater for myself.”
“Lucas,” she said quickly, “tell him—please tell him I said…hi.”
That was weird. Victoria always kept her emotions in check, but seeing she’d just lost that careful composure the second I mentioned my brother’s name meant something was going on.
Lucas was a touchy subject for a few people.
His twin, Wyatt, and our mother were at the top of that short list. I stayed out of it since it wasn’t my battle.
“Will do, Victoria,” I said with a smile—something I rarely gave—but sensed she needed right now. Which just goes to show I’m not always an asshole.
I n the car I had time to ponder, and more importantly, to digest , what I’d learned about the Blackwater estate and its management.
Much of it didn’t sit well with me, with the most disturbing revelation being the letting go of employees who had no retirement compensation in place.
How had that been allowed to happen? I was still in disbelief over what I’d discovered in those files.
My father had never been mercenary like that.
He took care of his people, and loyalty was always rewarded generously.
There hadn’t even been any health insurance.
It took some major self-control on my part to keep from confronting my mother, but I managed to hold myself back.
All I could hear was Brooke. “And no job for a woman who gave thirty-five years of her life working for one of those fine west-side mansions before they closed it down and dismissed everyone.” Every ounce of her bitterness justifiable.
Mrs. Casterley deserved so much more than what she’d received. It was now on me to fix it.
“Isaac, take me to Harris I’d talked myself out of pursuing her several times already just to shelve that plan the second I saw her walking across the street.
Jesus Christ, I was in major powerful lust with this girl.
Lust? It was a different feeling for me, though.
It wasn’t like the lust for sex I’d known in the past. It was more of a need.
A raw, unfiltered, almost frightening need—that quite honestly scared the ever-loving shit out of me.
I couldn’t explain why, but I felt like I just needed her.
Brooke was like a breath of fresh air into my very narrowly constrained life.
Refined, yet not haughty. Strong, but wielding her strength with a careful sense of purpose.
Fiery, but not with anger, just wickedly intelligent sass on the tip of her tongue ready to fly.
Someone who knew who she was, but not through entitlement and prestige.
In other words, a complete anomaly in my world.
She had a leather bag over her shoulder and a Starbucks in her hand.
Her expression was what I remembered from the cocktail party—beautiful but with that same touch of sadness.
I kept on taking in my front-row show until she was swallowed up by other bodies moving in front of her after she stepped onto the sidewalk.
She was going home after the end of her work day.
Home to Blackstone Island where she lived in a cottage above Fairchild Light at south-end—a place I probably hadn’t been since my high school days when James and the rest of us drank beer under the lighthouse in the summer and indulged in general teenage mayhem.
I would be on the island in few hours. Maybe I could see her this weekend. I reached for my phone and pulled her number up on Messenger…and just stared at it with absolutely no idea of what to say. The light turned green and the car moved on. I closed the Messenger app and put my phone away.
She was so young. The weird thing was she didn’t seem as young as her years.
Losing her parents at fifteen probably had something to do with it.
That would certainly make a kid grow up fast. But there was also the evidence of a life lived and the maturity of experience in how she handled herself.
The scar on her face possibly? The comment about “nobody puts their hands on me anymore ”?
I’d bet those two clues meant her life experience had been painful and she’d been hurt, so maybe that was the reason she appeared older than twenty-three.