Chapter 54
“Normally, I would try to persuade Cas to be the one to tell you all this, but he’s never going to be honest about it. He’s a coward.”
She had thought that less than an hour ago. Still, it angered her to hear him say it.
Rill shook his head. “Scoot and I have dealt with several other … situations. Jams he got himself into, associating with women he had no business with. Flying them to Europe for brunch … sending them designer clothing. And then there was the texting. Always the texting.”
Ingrid felt so faint that she realized she was leaning on Rill’s arms for support.
“Sexual stuff, yes, but more importantly, more dangerous to our family, promises. Promises he could never keep.”
Promises. The word was like a knife. Cas had never made any promises to her, had he?
“At one point or another, when the time would come to follow through on those promises, he would run like a scared little boy. There was Finley, Sailor’s friend …”
She stiffened. Finley. Of course.
“He promised her a family diamond. Then there was the daughter of a big coal family in Alabama. He told her she could have a job at the company … vice president of something, I don’t know.
Six-figure salary. Stock options. It was a mess.
But yeah … in the end, all he wanted to do was to talk.
He refused to lay a hand on her.” He rolled his eyes.
“My son, the celibate.” He sent her a sidelong look.
“The young lady was quite angry, to say the least. It got nasty, extremely complicated, and, in the end, very, very expensive for me.”
She felt her lip quiver.
He looked resigned. “I love my son, and in no way do I judge him for his hang-ups, but I can’t have him getting himself or this family dragged under a microscope.
My job, the job my grandfather entrusted me with, was protecting Savannah Sauce.
And to do that, I have to protect my family.
” He touched her cheek. “He hasn’t been texting you again, has he? ”
“No.” It was true. Since the night in mid-August there’d been nothing.
“But you’ve talked since then, right?” Rill watched her closely.
“He’s not going to do anything to displease you,” she said bitterly. “Trust me.”
“But I don’t trust him. I see the way he looks at you. And I don’t know how to stop this thing without turning it into some kind of Romeo and Juliet deal.”
She held her breath.
“The strange thing is, I find, Ingrid …” He stopped moving and looked intently at her. “I find that I am unwilling to let my son break your heart.”
Too late for that.
“I find”—Rill continued—“that I want you for myself.”
She froze in his arms. It was as if her entire brain had just shut down.
“You can’t be surprised. I told you at Lombardy’s.”
She nodded dully.
“Do you … have a reaction? Anything at all?”
Did she? How did she even feel about this man? She knew he was a bad person. Had done bad things. She also knew how other people would react if she took up with him. Even though he’d sent her away, Cas would be hurt. Sailor, too. But she’d be in London. Busy with her new husband.
But Rill Loeffler was here. Standing before her, offering her an alternative.
He was handsome. Charming. And incredibly rich. And she couldn’t lie; she had always enjoyed the attention he gave her.
So what if this was the answer to everything?
The man who had started it all.
He was even closer to her now, his face inches from hers.
“Just so you know, Scoot and I have an agreement. When she’s released from sober living, she’ll be moving to Tybee.
To a condo I bought for her there. She won’t make a fuss about anything I do.
About us.” His eyes looked like they’d been ignited by a blue flame.
“I’m the one who can make you happy, Ingrid.
I can and will take care of you forever. ”
She was quaking. And now realizing that she was also shaking her head. No, no, no … how could she do this? Even though Tess had abandoned her, could she really betray her own flesh and blood this way?
“What is it?” he demanded. “Tell me.”
“Just something I heard,” she said faintly.
“What?” He looked vulnerable, if that was even possible. “What did you hear?”
She closed her eyes. “That you slept with my mother when she was a teenager, and that’s why she left Savannah.”
He drew back, seemingly knocked off-balance. “Who told you that?” He held up a hand. “Wait. Don’t. It was Dean Remington, wasn’t it?”
Her heart was racing. She opened her eyes.
“Ingrid.” He laughed but it was a hollow sound.
“That man despises me. He always has. I won’t bore you with the details but his family and mine …
well, a long time ago there was a big kerfuffle over the origins of Savannah Sauce.
His grandfather and my grandfather, they really had to duke it out.
There was a settlement, but I think there’s hurt feelings on his side.
I’m just saying, he’s seen how we’ve welcomed you into our family.
He wouldn’t hesitate to try and poison you against me. ”
At that word poison she extricated herself from his arms.
“Ingrid,” he said softly, shaking his head.
Fix her little red wagon …
Ingrid pressed her fingers to her temples. Her thoughts whirled, crowding in on each other. Confusing her. “Dean wasn’t the one who told me about you and Tess … but he did tell me something else. Something that Scoot did to Edie.”
“That vicious little … still, after all these years with that fucking rumor.” Rill shook his head, then lifted a finger.
“Ingrid, listen to me. Scoot has her faults, believe me, but she would never do anything like that. She did not hurt Edie. Poison her, whatever Dean told you. And, for the record, I didn’t sleep with Tess. Whoever told you that lied, too.”
“I don’t know who to believe.” It was the truest, realest thing she’d said up to this point. She looked down at herself. The expensive dress that didn’t quite fit her, the borrowed shoes. “I don’t even know what I’m doing here.”
He fixed her with an intense look. “You’re here because I want you here. It’s that simple. I’ve wanted you from the first time I ever laid eyes on you, that night at Sailor’s party. I can’t defend it, Ingrid, and maybe it’s not right, but it’s the truth.”
He took her upper arms in his hands and searched her eyes.
In the dim light his were a blue fire. His expensive fig and cognac smell overpowered her.
He pressed his palm to her cheek. The palm where she’d seen the Via Lascivia.
The line of lust. She imagined it burning a furrow into her skin. Branding her.
His voice came out silken and persuasive. “One word is all I need, Ingrid. One word and everything could change … for both of us.”
She didn’t know what she was feeling.
No, that wasn’t right. She did know. She just didn’t like it. Didn’t want to admit it.
She was feeling relief.
Relief that if she agreed to Rill’s proposition, she wouldn’t be left out in the cold. She would be safe forever. From bills, from taxes, from any and every disaster that lurked just around the corner. She would never have to worry about money again. About anything ever again.
The thought of that, the reality of it, was overpowering, like a wave that knocked you over as you waded into the surf. That first bloom of well-being you felt with alcohol or weed when the chemicals flooded your brain. Her legs had gone weak and watery.
Fig and cognac …
They represented safety and strength, she realized. She imagined what it would be like to be enveloped in that fragrance forever—and instantly she knew.
It would be wonderful. Perfect.
This is what Edie should have done when she had the chance. Accepted Rill’s love, his care and his offer of protection. Everything would’ve been different. Rill wouldn’t have turned to Tess. He and Scoot wouldn’t have spent a lifetime torturing each other and their children.
Edie wouldn’t have died.
Ingrid felt her thoughts slow, to begin to reorder themselves. The light was piercing through the alcoholic fog in her brain. She saw it all so clearly now. She hadn’t been brought into the Loefflers’ lives for Sailor or for Cas.
No.
It had been for Rill. Rill, all along.
All she had to do was say yes and she knew that would right all balances, once and for all.
“Ingrid? What’s your answer?”