Chapter 23
Chapter Twenty-Three
FORD
Sunday dinner was usually a production at Heartstone Manor, though not as formal as it had been when I was a child.
Some of my siblings and their partners dressed up.
Some of us didn’t bother. Edgar and Harvey usually attended, and liked to harrumph at the presence of children at the formal dining table, but Griffen and Hope had made it clear this was their house, and children would always be an included part of the family.
I suspected that while Edgar and Harvey made a show of not liking it, secretly, they enjoyed having the kids around.
Everyone liked seeing Heartstone brought back to life.
Everyone except Cole Haywood, of course.
Hope had called her uncle Edgar and asked him to bring Harvey and be there an hour early.
Edgar had agreed, without asking why. Hope could usually get him to do what she wanted with less explanation than the rest of us would require.
He’d raised her since she was a young child, saving her from her criminally neglectful parents.
Edgar was gruff and not overly affectionate, but Hope was the daughter of his heart.
And while he wasn’t overflowing with hugs and kisses, it was clear that in his own way, he was devoted to her.
He’d had an extra layer of smug satisfaction ever since she’d married Griffen and given birth to Stella.
In his old-school way of seeing things, he couldn’t have done better than to get her married off and popping out babies for the Sawyer heir.
It was only icing on the cake to him that they were head over heels in love with each other.
He and I had always worked well together.
Edgar and my father, along with Harvey, had been best friends.
Harvey had handled a lot of their legal business—his focus had always been the law—whereas Edgar had been Prentice’s business partner in many of Prentice’s investments.
Though they’d frequently disagreed, they’d been on the same page more often than not.
While Edgar wasn’t the monster Prentice had been, I couldn’t say he was my favorite person.
He was tougher than Harvey, more likely to think the ends justified the means.
Though I knew Edgar looked at me with as much suspicion as I had for him, there’d been things over the years I’d said yes to—like the deal that had almost gotten Finn killed—that Edgar wouldn’t have touched.
He was ruthless in business, but he had morals Prentice had lacked.
Morals I’d ignored for longer than I liked to think about.
I wasn’t that man anymore, but Edgar didn’t know that.
Not for sure. As he and Harvey walked into Griffen’s office, he gave me a cautious, borderline suspicious look, his gaze bouncing from Griffen and back to me.
It didn’t hurt, but only because I wasn’t surprised.
I wondered if he thought we were about to make an announcement about the future of the family business.
That wasn’t going to happen. My place there was gone, and I wasn’t sure I wanted it back.
I had a lot to figure out before I settled on what I was going to do with the rest of my life.
Though I had to admit, ever since Cole had put out his bounty and I’d been stuck at Heartstone, I’d missed Avery’s brewery.
I liked working with my siblings and seeing Sawyers Bend Brewing flourish.
I had the nagging feeling of missing out on Finn’s work getting the kitchen into shape.
Out of nowhere, I realized I was hoping we’d have this assassin problem dealt with before Finn was ready to open.
I didn’t want to miss out on more of my siblings’ lives than I already had.
“Well, what’s all this about?” Edgar narrowed his eyes on Hope. “I don’t see any champagne.”
“Why would we have champagne?” Hope asked.
“I thought you were going to announce you were expecting again,” he grumped.
Hope let out a laugh that was half amused and half terrified. “I can barely keep up with Stella!”
“Well, you’re not getting any younger—”
“Edgar, enough,” Griffen said with a shake of his head. Hope reached out to take his hand. “Everyone, sit down.” He pushed out his desk chair and took a seat himself, pulling Hope into his lap. “No baby announcements, Edgar. Sorry to disappoint,” he said, not sounding sorry at all.
Edgar’s attention switched to me. “You’re jumping back into the family business, then?”
I shook my head before he finished the question. “It’s not about that either. That’s Griffen’s problem now. He doesn’t need me getting in the way.” Griffen looked at me, surprise flashing across his face. “This is about our mother.”
“Sarah?” Harvey asked, his voice soft, eyes sad. “How could anything be about Sarah? She’s been gone for over thirty years.”
“Do either of you remember meeting or doing business with a man named Paul Williams before our mother left?” Griffen asked.
Edgar started to shake his head. He went still as Harvey’s gaze snapped to Paige’s face, his eyes focused intently as he studied her features.
“I knew you looked familiar,” Harvey said, an edge to his voice, “when you came in to interview with Hope. I just couldn’t place you. You have his eyes. You’re his daughter?”
Paige gave a short nod. “I am, but I never knew him,” she said.
“How did you meet Paul Williams?” I asked.
“He had business with Prentice,” Edgar said, looking between Harvey and Paige.
“I guess I see the resemblance, in the eyes and the hair.” He nodded slowly.
“I wouldn’t have spotted it unless you brought up Paul’s name.
” He shook his head again and looked at Paige and me.
“Prentice and I had gone in on some commercial real estate. A series of connected strip centers up in Johnson City. We owned two. Paul owned the one in between. We had plans to develop the whole strip, but we weren’t interested in bringing on a partner.
Paul didn’t want to redevelop, but he was willing to sell.
He and Prentice had a difference of opinion on what that sale should look like. ”
“And you?” I asked. “Where did you stand?”
Edgar looked up at the ceiling as if lost in memory, then met my eyes.
“I’d say I was in between. Paul had some restrictions on his current leases I wasn’t interested in honoring.
But I felt he was more realistic on the price than Prentice.
You know your father could be stubborn as hell.
He had in mind the deal he wanted to make.
He wasn’t willing to budge on the numbers. Neither was Williams.”
“How often did Paul Williams visit Heartstone?” I asked.
Edgar drew in a slow breath, putting the pieces together in his mind.
“As I recall,” he said, “only a few times, and he never stayed in the house.” He closed his eyes for a moment, and when he opened them, he said, “Now that I think back, I don’t know where he stayed.
He was from Ohio, but he had business investments nearby—real estate in Tennessee, South Carolina.
He traveled a lot, I know that. But how are you his daughter,” he said to Paige, “if you’ve never met him? ”
Paige sighed. “He was married to my mother, Harriet McKenna. She was pregnant with me when he told her he’d found someone else, and he left.”
I studied Harvey and Edgar sitting side by side on the leather sofa, facing the matching sofa Paige and I sat on.
Harvey looked uncomfortable; Edgar, thoughtful, as if he was puzzling out the bits of information we’d given him to put together the picture.
It wouldn’t take him long. I knew how Edgar’s mind worked. And he was sharp.
“You think Paul Williams is the man your mother left with?” His eyes shot to Harvey, seeking agreement.
Harvey let out a gusty sigh. “He might have been. I don’t ever recall them meeting, but he could have bumped into Sarah in the house, or even in town if that’s where he stayed.
She was always so focused on you boys back then,” Harvey said, his eyes going from Griffen to me.
“But she could have slipped away to see him.”
“And that’s why you’re here,” Edgar said to Paige, his eyes narrowing on her face as if assessing what kind of trouble she might cause.
I squeezed her hand in mine. Edgar could be intimidating, but I wouldn’t let him scare Paige off.
She nodded. “I found a trunk of his things after my mother passed. Inside, I found letters from Sarah,” she said, her voice calm but her fingers gripping mine so tightly I was sure her knuckles were white.
“Letters?” Harvey asked. “They wrote to each other?”
“She wrote to him,” Paige said. “And from the content of her letters, it seemed like there were probably letters back from him to her, but we haven’t found any.”
“You’ve been looking?” Harvey asked, his white brows drawing together.
“Of course,” I said, rubbing my thumb over the back of Paige’s hand.
“They left thirty-five years ago,” Edgar reminded me. “Is there a point? When was the last time you heard from your mother?”
“I stopped getting birthday postcards in my early twenties,” I said.
Griffen agreed. “Same for me. Not that there was much to them in the first place, but they were something.” Neither of us mentioned the handwriting issue, waiting, in unspoken agreement, to see what Harvey and Edgar knew before we told them everything.
“Were you surprised when she left?” Hope asked quietly, looking at her uncle.
Edgar shook his head, raising one eyebrow.
“Surprise doesn’t cover it, Hope. Sarah was devoted to her sons,” he said with a glance at Griffen and then me.
“I think it’s safe to say you two were her only joy.
That she would leave her children for a man, even one she was in love with—I never would have thought.
” He gave a half shrug of one shoulder. “People surprise you.”