Chapter 29
Chapter Twenty-Nine
J enny prayed that the Senator wouldn’t deny knowing Svetlana Markova. There could be plenty of reasons he hadn’t been forthcoming earlier in the year when he denied knowing anybody matching the description of the woman in the tree. Fifty years was a long time. Svetlana was a visitor in America, and maybe he assumed that she’d simply returned to the Soviet Union. Even so, anxiety made the muscles in her neck ache as she drove to the Wakefield estate.
“I hope you’re not afraid of dogs,” Jenny said to Crenshaw, who was sitting in the passenger seat as her pickup rounded the bend. The Wakefield Manor stood at the end of a long drive, and even from here, the baying of the hounds pierced the air and ratcheted her already tense nerves even tighter.
Agent Crenshaw winced a little. “They’re not my favorite thing in the world.”
Raymond’s pack of English foxhounds had already been released from the kennel to roam in the fenced pasture beside the house, barking and snuffling and baying. The throaty dog-howls sounded intimidating even to Jenny.
Trucks and horse trailers crowded the drive, and the quarterly fox hunt was about to get underway. Early morning mist swirled above the grassy lawn and a dozen riders in traditional red hunting garb were already mounted while others loitered near the refreshment table.
How different this seemed from the photographs from the 1950s, where staff served the riders from silver trays. Today, the staff no longer wore those fussy black-and-white dresses but simple buff slacks with white polo shirts. She recognized Mrs. Darby, the housekeeper who’d been with the family for years, setting out a tray of warm cranberry muffins.
Jenny approached. “Is Senator Wakefield available?”
Mrs. Darby straightened. “Yes, but he’s not taking visitors today. He’s heading off to Washington this afternoon.”
“I’d just like to say hello,” she said. And ask him if he remembers Svetlana Markova , she silently added to herself.
“He’ll be out to say a few words before the hunt starts,” Mrs. Darby said. “I’ll let him know you’re here.” The housekeeper carefully waded through the pack of snuffling, anxious hounds while Jenny leaned against the fence with Agent Crenshaw.
“Remember, say nothing about the photographs,” Agent Crenshaw said. “Give him the chance to talk himself into a corner. I’ll let you do all the talking, but I’ll be listening.
Raymond trotted his horse toward them. With tall black boots, a red jacket, and a white cravat expertly tied around his throat, he looked like he could have just stepped out of the eighteenth century as he tipped his head toward her.
“Jenny, come to watch the hunt?”
She nodded. “It’s been a while since I’ve seen one, and it’s always an impressive sight.”
Raymond flushed with pride. “Indeed. The baroness and I laid the scent before dawn, and the hounds are raring to go.” He glanced behind her shoulder and his entire body tensed. “Father,” Raymond said stiffly.
Jenny turned to see Senator Wakefield arriving at the stables. He couldn’t have missed his son’s greeting but didn’t even glance at or acknowledge Raymond in any way as he walked to the refreshment table. The other riders noticed the senator’s arrival and began leading their horses a little closer.
The senator raised a glass. “Friends!” he called out in a healthy, robust voice. “Welcome to the famous quarterly Wakefield hunt. This year marks our seventy-fifth anniversary of the hunt, a celebration of sportsmanship, comradery, and tradition. As you follow the hounds, give thanks for the natural splendor of the Florida countryside. Be kind to your horses and to each other, give thanks for the good weather, and ride safely. Carry on!”
The gate was opened and the blast of a trumpet released the hounds, who howled in delight as they raced toward the line of oaks in the distance. Then the ground vibrated from the thunderous stampede of horses’ hooves as the riders followed.
“Quite a show,” Agent Crenshaw said. He visibly relaxed once the dogs were gone, their barks fading into the distance.
The senator stared at the riders as they rounded a bend of mounded haystacks and galloped toward a line of trees. It took almost a minute before the ground stopped vibrating. The senator had been witnessing these awe-inspiring hunts all the way back to his youth, but he still seemed entranced as he stared after the riders.
“Keeping it up is all Raymond’s doing,” he said softly.
“You must be very proud,” Jenny said. It didn’t matter that foxhunting was a snobby, rich person’s sport. Raising these hounds and preparing the course was still a lot of work.
“Am I?” he said, but perhaps she imagined the tragic look in his eye because a moment later he sent her a grandfatherly smile.
“What brings you out so bright and early?” he asked. “Raymond has been hosting these hunts for a decade, but I haven’t seen you here in years.”
This was it. This was what she’d been dreading from the moment she saw the photographs of a blissfully young and hopeful Max Wakefield smiling alongside Svetlana.
“I wanted to catch you before you headed off to Washington,” she said, a chill racing through her in the damp morning air. “We finally got a positive identification on the woman in the cypress tree. Her name was Svetlana Markova. Does it ring a bell?”
Please don’t deny it , she silently prayed.
The senator’s grandfatherly expression didn’t change. No flicker of surprise, no hint of fear. “Svetlana,” he said slowly. “That’s a very distinctive name. I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone named Svetlana.”
A weight settled on her chest because the senator’s denial had just skyrocketed the odds that he was somehow involved in Svetlana’s demise.
“You’re sure?” she prompted. “You never knew anyone named Svetlana Markova?”
Again, his patient expression didn’t waver as the senator peered down at her. “Never,” he lightly said. “Who was she? And how did they identify her?”
It took effort to block the disappointment from showing on her face. There could still be a legitimate reason for him to deny knowing Svetlana. Maybe she went by a different name when she was here. Maybe he was protecting someone. Jenny parsed her words carefully, trying to coax the senator’s memory.
“She came from the Soviet Union. She worked for your father’s charity . . . the World Famine Commission. She disappeared in 1952, but before then she travelled all over America, learning whatever she could about modern agriculture. She seemed like a nice person.”
The senator patted her on the shoulder. “Well, I’m glad you finally have a name to go with your mystery lady. She’s been dead a long time, so you needn’t sound so sad. And now you must excuse me; I have a flight to catch.”
Jenny watched him depart, wondering if all politicians found it so easy to lie. The senator’s firm denial of ever knowing Svetlana Markova didn’t bode well, and the FBI now had a prime suspect for who killed one of their agents all those years ago.
Wyatt’s first duty this morning was to question Mrs. Hawkins about Svetlana. It was odd to call on her so early in the morning, but it needed to happen at the same time Jenny would be questioning Senator Wakefield. Instead of his uniform, he wore ordinary street clothes and used his own vehicle to drive to her house. He didn’t want her feeling like she was being interrogated or that she was a suspect.
Because she isn’t. There was no earthly way Mrs. Hawkins could have had anything to do with Svetlana’s downfall.
Wyatt rang the doorbell for the second-floor apartment. A patter of footsteps sounded moments later, and then the door opened. Mrs. Hawkins was already dressed in a nice blazer with a Wakefield Museum name tag pinned to her lapel.
“Hello, Wyatt,” she said in surprise. “What brings you out so early?”
“I’ve got a few questions about the skeleton that was found on Summerlin Groves. It looks like you’re heading out to the museum, but have you got a few minutes?”
If Mrs. Hawkins was surprised or nervous, she gave no hint of it as she held the door wide and beckoned him inside. He followed her up a narrow staircase to her second-story home. As always, it smelled like lavender. It reminded him of her fourth-grade classroom, where she kept potted lavender plants and taught the class how to care for them.
Morning sunshine streamed through the front windows, and Dr. Hawkins nodded a greeting from the dinette table where he’d been reading a newspaper.
“This won’t take long,” Wyatt said, refusing the invitation for a cup of coffee. “The authorities have finally identified the skeleton found on Jenny’s property. Her name was Svetlana Markova. Do either of you remember her?”
Mrs. Hawkins seemed taken aback. She caught her breath and glanced away, but after a moment she shook her head. “That name doesn’t sound familiar. Do you remember anyone, Alvin?”
“Can’t say that I do,” Dr. Hawkins replied. Mrs. Hawkins met her husband in college, and he didn’t move to Amity until several years after Svetlana had died.
“Here’s a photograph of her,” Wyatt said, opening his folder to reveal the enlarged photo. It was the one of Svetlana sitting on the farmhouse porch swing, laughing and looking straight at the photographer.
Mrs. Hawkins blanched. She swallowed a few times, then smoothed all expression from her face. She made no effort to touch or look at the photo again.
“Is that what she looked like?” she finally asked.
A chair creaked as Dr. Hawkins stood and crossed the room, peering at the photograph. “Pretty lady,” he said.
“She was,” Wyatt confirmed. “Mrs. Hawkins? You’re sure you don’t remember her?”
“No, Wyatt. I don’t remember her.” She hadn’t looked at the photo again, and her voice didn’t sound quite as confident as before. It sounded weak and shaken, and perhaps a little sad.
“What year did you say she died?” Dr. Hawkins asked.
“We think it was in the spring or summer of 1952.”
“Hmmm,” Dr. Hawkins said, walking toward a hallway closet. He began pawing through boxes and holiday decorations on closet shelves.
“What are you looking for?” Mrs. Hawkins asked, a hint of frustration in her voice.
“I’m trying to help you remember,” her husband replied. “You collected so many things from that year. That was your senior year, right? There might be something in your high school memorabilia box.”
Dr. Hawkins nudged a stepstool out and climbed up to reach the top shelf.
“Stop it, Alvin,” Mrs. Hawkins scolded. “You’re going to get yourself killed!”
The old man reached both arms up to wiggle a bulky cardboard box from the top shelf. Wyatt reached up to help bring it down while Dr. Hawkins quietly chuckled.
“Why did you save all this stuff if you aren’t ever going to look at it?” Dr. Hawkins set the box on the dining table, then lifted the cardboard cover. Notebooks, papers, and knickknacks filled the box.
“Look at this, Millicent!” Dr. Hawkins lifted up a pair of roller skates. He flicked a wheel that squeaked and wobbled as it rotated.
Mrs. Hawkins smothered a laugh. “I’d risk my life if I tried to roller skate now, but I used to be pretty good.”
Dr. Hawkins grabbed the school yearbook from 1952 and opened it to the index. “Nobody named Markova in here,” he said. “I guess she wasn’t a teacher, then.”
“I already told you that,” Mrs. Hawkins said, back to being surly and frustrated. “I’m sorry, Wyatt. I have no idea who that woman was. Simply no idea.”
The box was stuffed with old report cards, a plaque from the debate club, and a scrapbook. Dr. Hawkins began flipping through yellowed newspaper clippings, but Mrs. Hawkins gazed at something in the box with pained fondness.
It was a clear orb about the size of a grapefruit snug against the corner of the box. Mrs. Hawkins lifted it out, her hands tender as she cradled it. A perfectly preserved flower rested inside.
It was the corsage from her high school prom. Wyatt instantly recognized it from the old prom photos because it was so unique: a violet orchid with a spray of tiny lavender buds behind it.
“I went to the science teacher to figure out how to save this,” she said. “I was afraid it wouldn’t work, but I did everything he told me. I dried the blooms in silica gel, then mixed up the resin and made the mold.”
She cradled the preserved orchid in her hands, gazing at it in awe. “And here it is, fifty years later, just as pretty as it was back then. Perfect.”
The violet orchid was forever young, suspended in the clear orb and surrounded by lavender buds. Dr. Hawkins stopped pawing through the box, watching his wife with an expression of tentative worry. Wyatt could barely breathe. Mrs. Hawkins blinked suspiciously fast as she set the preserved orchid back in its corner of the box.
“There now,” she whispered, almost as if she was talking to the blossom.
She shook the melancholy away as she loaded the yearbook and report cards back into the box, stacking them up with ruthless efficiency, her expression both determined and tragic.
Dr. Hawkins set an arm around her shoulders. “It’s okay, babe. You’re gonna be okay.”
There could be no doubt of their affection as Mrs. Hawkins leaned on her husband, accepting comfort over a long-ago love affair that ended badly. A range of expressions crossed the old woman’s face before she pulled out of her husband’s embrace.
“You know what?” she asked, her voice suddenly bright with resolve. She returned to the box of memories and removed the orchid. “Wyatt, how about you give this to Senator Wakefield the next time you see him? I don’t need it anymore. Tell Max he can keep it or toss it or do whatever he likes with it. It’s time for me to let it go.”
She extended the orchid, but Wyatt was hesitant to take it. “Are you sure?”
“I’m sure,” she said, even as she smiled through a sheen of tears. He felt like a cad taking it from her, but Mrs. Hawkins seemed determined to sound cheerful.
“So, you’ve got that special election coming up, right?” Her voice was artificially bright.
He nodded. “It’s tomorrow.”
“Alvin and I will be sure to vote for you. I’m going to be late for work unless we get a move on, right?”
Wyatt left with the preserved orchid in its clear resin orb and wished to the bottom of his soul Mrs. Hawkins hadn’t tried so hard to act like everything was normal. It wasn’t. She was a bad liar and it looked like her heart was splitting in half when she gave him her old corsage from a long-ago high school prom.
Mrs. Hawkins failed the test. Now he needed to meet with Jenny to learn if the senator did, too.
Wyatt had to put in a full day at the office before driving out to the grove to compare notes with Jenny. Crenshaw had returned to Tampa, so they were on their own for piecing together what they’d learned.
Darkness shrouded the rural country road. There weren’t any streetlamps or cheerfully lit shops or restaurants to light the way to her home . . . just the beams from two headlights illuminating mile after mile of blank countryside. Why did the perfect woman have to live in the middle of nowhere?
If he left Jenny to chase his dreams, he would probably end up like Mrs. Hawkins, cradling an orchid trapped in resin and wondering what might have been. Or in his case, a cactus garden he’d never been able to let go.
He stopped his truck beside the closed gate outside the grove and hopped out to press the button on the panel. “I’m here,” he said into the tinny speaker. “Can you open the gate?”
A moment later the metal gates creaked open and he drove through. It was probably his imagination, but they sounded like the gates of a prison cell as they closed behind him.
He shouldn’t read too much into it. He was upset and despondent because the fourth-grade teacher he’d always idolized looked him in the face and lied. At best, she was protecting someone. At worst, she played a part in a murder.
Jenny stood on the front porch, wearing jeans and a white T-shirt and looking like every red-blooded male’s fantasy of sexy, strong femininity. She was dressed exactly as she’d been the first time he saw her outside the orange juice plant. He fell halfway in love with her that day, and it had only deepened with time.
He rolled down the passenger window. “Let’s go for a drive.” If he had to stay here, he’d suffocate.
Jenny’s hair bounced as she sprang down the steps and slid into the truck. “Where are we going?”
Anywhere but here , he silently thought. “I’m in the mood for a drive.”
They left the grove and Jenny summarized her meeting with the senator. Max Wakefield flat out denied knowing anyone named Svetlana, exactly as Mrs. Hawkins had. Senator Wakefield was good at deception, Mrs. Hawkins was lousy at it, but they were both lying.
It was depressing, and Wyatt kept driving until they reached Amity. Most of the town square was dark because everything except the Brickhouse closed at six o’clock. He passed the center of town, the library, and the road leading to the high school where they’d both graduated. He knew each of these streets as well as the back of his hand. Youthful dreams of venturing to Morocco or Tallahassee would remain just that. Dreams. Youthful, magnificent, thwarted dreams.
Only the hum of the engine and hiss of wheels sounded as they headed north of Amity. This was some of the prettiest sections of the county. It was too dark to see much of the horse farm behind a white fence lining the road, but for once he knew exactly where he was going.
Jenny probably did, too. There was a time when these stolen moments outside of town had been the best hours of his life.
He slowed the pickup as he approached the turn-off. The gravel lane was buckled, pitted, and so narrow that twigs slapped the sides of the pickup. He navigated around a ridge of exposed granite, then parked beside the old tupelo tree. He stared straight ahead, letting the engine idle.
“You remembered,” she finally said.
The corner of his mouth lifted. “I remember everything.”
Once upon a time this was the spot where they came to be alone, to escape her brother or the noise from other people’s parties at his condo. How many warm summer evenings had they lain in the pickup bed on this exact spot to marvel at the millions of stars scattered above? It had been a blissful time. Now his heart was heavy, battered by two years of grief and shame over how he’d treated Jenny. The raft of unanswered questions about Svetlana swirled in his mind. He took a sobering breath and stared straight ahead while he spoke.
“I don’t know what happened to drive the senator and Mrs. Hawkins apart all those years ago, but I saw the photographs. They loved each other. Even now, fifty years after they went their separate ways, they’re still protecting each other. They know what happened, and yet they’re keeping the secret. Why? I think they’re both good people.”
“So was Svetlana,” Jenny said.
Everything hurt. Mrs. Hawkins was harboring secrets. His mother was clinically depressed and might never come out of it. He’d lost the love of his life, even though she sat two feet away. He was on the cusp of losing the election for a job he desperately wanted.
“Oh, Jenny,” he said. In a perfect world he could give her a Fabergé egg and snap his fingers to restore her orange grove and cure his mother. Those things weren’t possible, but it was time to make some hard choices.
“Jenny, I love you,” he said simply. “When I am old and gray, I will still love you.”
“Do you?” she asked. “Because it hasn’t felt like it.”
He looked away.
“I should have brought you to the debate. I shouldn’t have abandoned you because of what Jack did. These last couple of years have been harder on you than on me, and I should have been there for you.”
“Wyatt, don’t make me find the strength to cheer you up.” She gave him a gentle shove. “Weeper.”
He stifled a spurt of laughter, but the humor vanished quickly. “I’m going to lose the election tomorrow,” he said, hating to admit the truth. He didn’t want to live on an orange grove, but if that was the price for winning Jenny, he was willing to pay it.
He turned off the ignition. “Come on. Let’s go look at the stars.”
They both got out and headed to the rear of the truck. After lowering the tailgate, he climbed inside and spread a blanket.
Jenny clambered in beside him. They simply lay on their backs, held hands, and gazed at the stars overhead. His sister’s life had been snuffed out too soon and nothing could ever change that, but he couldn’t crawl into the grave with her. It was time to live the life he chose for himself, not the one Jack Summerlin inflicted on him. He wanted Jenny to be his wife. They belonged together. Joy and relief bloomed inside, even though it meant letting go of other dreams.
“I want us to be together,” he said. “Life can change in an instant, and I don’t want to spend another hour with distance between us.”
She rolled onto her side to face him. “I can’t go through the rest of my life hiding from your mother.”
“You won’t go through another day. I want us to be together. I’m willing to live in that old farmhouse on your grove if you’ll have me.”
She propped up on an elbow. “What are you asking?”
Leave it to Jenny to be blunt and direct. He sat up and took both her hands in his. “I want a future with you. I want a wife, and kids, and years of waking up beside you, even if it’s in the middle of an orange grove. Jenny, will you marry me?”
“You could really live on the grove?” Her voice held a world of hope, and it was humbling to see how desperately she wanted this. He would give it to her.
“Yes, Jenny,” he said, tracing his fingers along the side of her jaw. “On the grove. If you’ll marry me, I’ll settle down wherever you will be.”
Her smile was blinding in its radiance. “Yes, Wyatt. I love you and want us to be married.”
They held each other as the moon rose in the night sky. Overhead, a million stars scattered across the sky, and they were only two insignificant people in God’s vast universe, and yet he’d never felt more grounded and certain. They were on the right path. It was the springtime of their lives and anything was possible.
An overwhelming sense of quiet joy bloomed inside. It was a transcendent experience, almost divine. Overhead, the luminous ribbon of the Milky Way arched across the sky, huge and vast and beautiful. A shimmering feeling of enchantment hovered in the air.
“Do you feel it, Jenny?”
She squeezed his hand. He had no explanation for this immense feeling of happiness, only that it was blessed and wonderful and fleeting. It couldn’t last, but he knew it to be an echo of Eden.
“We should go to church in the morning,” she said.
He instantly agreed. This fleeting sense of awe would be gone soon, but it needed to be honored and acknowledged. God never promised him a life without loss or pain, but glimpses of divine blessings were all around if he remembered to look for them.
He would not forget again.