Chapter 26
Chapter Twenty-Six
Charline had a lonely Christmas day after Trent’s energizing visit on Christmas Eve.
She had seen the envelope on the tree before anyone else and knew instantly it was from Trent.
She snatched it off the branch and hid it.
Her mother and Suzette were happy enough with the lovely gift he’d left the night before.
The generous gift certificate to Saks would come in handy.
She’d cornered Diggins and questioned him about the envelope. She hadn’t dared to open it. Diggins admitted to conspiring with Trent. Trent had told him he wanted the man to see that it went to good use around the house.
“He gave us money?” She nearly squeaked the words, appalled at the notion. Diggins nodded guiltily.
When she finally opened the envelope, dizziness took her when she digested the number she saw on the cashier’s check. She could hardly see the note, but forced herself to read it while her heart pounded. Telling herself she’d return the money, no matter what the note said, she read it.
Charlie, I know your first instinct is going to be to return this gift, but please reconsider. Think about how you will be depriving me of the great joy of playing Santa Claus to one of the most deserving women I’ve ever met.
If depriving me of joy doesn’t sway you, then think about how you’d be depriving your sister and your mother of the comforts they deserve.
Especially your mother. I know you applied for a loan to pay for her nursing care—don’t be mad at Diggins for sharing the secret—I pressed him mercilessly.
I know you and your family need this money.
And I need to give it to you, need to see you taken care of.
Accepting this gift graciously is the right thing to do and I want you to have it more than anything else. Accepting this gift would be your gift to me this Christmas and would mean everything to me.
All my love, Trent
Her first instinct was to crumple the note and yell.
He’d been right about her not wanting to accept it.
He’d also been right about everything else he’d said.
She couldn’t make herself turn him down or deprive her mother and sister.
She didn’t want to be so needy, didn’t want him to be the one she owed, didn’t want to depend on him, of all people.
They already had so much poison between them.
Owing him this debt only added to the shame.
But that wasn’t very gracious of her and it was a discredit to his act of generosity. He hadn’t been offering the gift to buy anything from her, to make her owe him. He wanted to play Santa Claus, the way he’d done with Dylan and his family.
She didn’t like the fact that he thought of her and her family as needy, but he’d been right.
In spite of all her best efforts, it had come down to mortgaging the family home to pay expenses.
None of that would matter to her, but she had to think of her sister and mother. Especially her mother. Especially now.
She’d eventually uncrumpled the note, but not to reread it, only to stare at the last line. And wonder. All my love, Trent.
Was it a throwaway line, like his careless smiles? Or did he…
No, she couldn’t go there. Wouldn’t. It didn’t even matter.
They could never have a real relationship after sharing all the lies and deceptions, all the criminal conspiring between them.
Theirs was an unhealthy relationship. She was poison to him, dragging him down with the forbidden fruit of her serum from the garden of Charline.
Empty dessert plates sat in front of them, but no one was in a hurry to end the meal.
“Charline, let’s have your wedding reception at the Boston Harbor Hotel. It should be lovely there in April.”
“It does sound lovely, Mother, but—”
“I’ll call them tomorrow,” Suzette said. “I hope it’s not too late. We may need to have your wedding on a weeknight. We’re behind on making plans.”
“Don’t worry Suzette, we can move the date—”
“Nonsense,” her mother said. She and Suzette snapped their heads to look at her mother, at the tone of voice she used, as if she were scolding them. Charline realized her mother was worried about postponing the wedding because of her failing health.
“If anything, I think you should consider moving the date up. Let’s see, the Super Bowl is in February. There’s nothing wrong with the first week of March, is there?”
“I don’t know—”
“Talk to Trent, dear. From what I could see, he’s sufficiently taken with you to say yes to whatever you want.”
Suzette agreed and giggled.
Charline’s conscience squirmed. She needed to talk to Trent about a plan for their breakup before long. There was no way she could allow her mother and Suzette to start planning her wedding, to spend money they didn’t have. For absolutely nothing.
She’d been foolishly ignoring reality, not even taking into consideration that her mother might want to plan her wedding.
The wasted expense made her cringe. She knew they’d be throwing the money down the drain.
Even in spite of Trent’s gift, the last thing they should be doing with the family’s money was throwing it down the toilet for a wedding that would never be.
Rising from the table, she forced herself to end the holiday meal, to end her foolish romantic notions about Trent, and get back to what was really important.
She promised herself she’d go into the office early the next day and every day from now on. Until the end of the serum drug trial.
And she wouldn’t go to anymore of Trent’s practices. She’d talk to Ralph about it first thing in the morning. Now that he was getting declining doses of serum until he was off them altogether in ten days, she could be on call for emergencies only.
University Research Center, Friday, January 3rd
It was eight a.m. and Charline already needed to get up from her desk and stretch, give her eyes a rest from the computer screen.
It was close enough to the end of the drug trial and they had enough of the data in so that she was beginning to draft her paper.
She’d finally succeeded in ridding herself of the disappointment that she hadn’t heard from Trent after she’d called Ralph.
Ralph told her Trent was busy focusing on football and they agreed that with the declining doses of the serum, he could handle the injections.
He assured her he knew what to look for and would call her immediately if anything came up—even anything minor.
That was how they’d left it eight days ago.
Tomorrow was the first playoff game and it was away.
Anxiety filled her thinking about not going to the game, but not as much as the anxiety she had when she thought about being there.
Ralph had communicated that it was Trent’s understanding that she would be at the game. After all, their fake engagement was still on. Though not for long. It would all end the when the season ended for the Minutemen, the next time they lost a game.
Pacing around her office, the sadness began to creep in again.
She squeezed her eyes shut as if she could shut out the stabbing sense of loss.
The shrill sound of the phone on her desk startled her.
In spite of all her attempts at disciplining her emotions, her heart leapt as she reached to answer the phone, thinking, hoping, wishing it would be Trent.
Picking up the phone in the rush, she said hello.
“Dr. Morneau, you’re in your office early.” Hogarth’s dark voice made her skin prickle with slimy dread like a snake crawling across her skin.
“As always. I’m busy. What do you want?”
“That’s no way to talk to your boss.” He paused. She waited him out, concentrating on maintaining her cool.
“Especially since I’m calling to give you a heads-up.
The university police aren’t finished with their internal investigation into the HGH serum theft and they plan to report it to the city police—I couldn’t talk them out of bringing the police in, making it an official investigation.
You’ll need to sanitize your records and everything else about the research meticulously. If you want to stay out of trouble.”
Her blood pressure rose like lava from a volcano. She didn’t know if she was more alarmed about the official police investigation or angry with Hogarth’s implication that she had something to hide. But that anger was misplaced because he was right, she reminded herself.
“Don’t worry,” was all she said and she hung up.
In that first moment of panic, all she could think was that she needed to call Trent. She picked up her phone, hesitated, then slammed the desk phone back into its cradle. Bad move. He was at practice and this was the playoffs. He probably wouldn’t even answer her.
Besides, they were coming to her office and she needed to take care of whatever there was here, not waste time worrying him.
What could they find here? She’d brought all the paper files to his penthouse, along with some equipment and supplies.
She had supplies, some of the serum at the stadium and at her home too.
But at the office, all there was were some data files about John Doe on her desktop computer. It would be okay.
After vacillating, she decided to exclude the booster serum data and all reference to John Doe and his data from her reports. It wasn’t worth the risk. She’d tell Hogarth that John Doe was a wash-out if he asked.