Chapter 10
T HE DIRE STRAITS Noir faced seemed unreal. Yet, for the better of three years, Carrah had been passionate about redefining product and fragrance lines. Every idea she pitched was shot down, citing funding or bad timing. Even after the rejection, she still managed to tinker around in the lab with hopes of developing something they would greenlight for production.
And that was what happened with Aimer. Carrah had been experimenting while responding to market demands. She considered her needs as a young consumer while preserving the old ways of Noir. Through trial and error she re-created a scent she’d remembered upon her grandmother and then infused it with an exotic blend of plumeria and hints of vanilla.
Carrah gave her mother a sample for Mother’s Day, and the next thing she knew, the fragrance had a limited-quantity product run. Camille had loved the scent so much that she pulled her heiress card and demanded Aimer be brought to market, where the perfume became an overnight sensation. Its success opened everyone’s eyes, especially her father’s, who was blinded by Beau’s ambition. Unfortunately, as Carrah found out today, it was too late.
Although now it all made sense. She understood why they had been pressing her to complete product mocks and briefs. Only, her attention was on the manuscript she’d written. Besides, there were conditions she disagreed with that linked her to a man she wanted nothing to do with. How could she possibly create?
The right thing for Carrah to do was to sit at her desk, finalize product specs, ensure the concentrations of ingredients were accurate, and double-check the suppliers of raw materials list to make the product brief complete before sending the final draft to Beau. Instead, she stumbled around getting dressed for a debutante function that wouldn’t start for hours and left the house with nowhere to really go until much later.
After her mind stopped tussling with the precarious situation the company seemed to be facing and her thoughts of Beau’s archaic ideal of a bride price were overridden by the lingering pain at her ankle, she found herself driving along the hidden path to the Caldwell mansion. She removed her foot from the gas and quickly texted Reggie to avoid breaking etiquette of showing up unannounced.
Once Carrah received a thumbs-up reply, she drove forward, admiring the picturesque curb appeal of the rosebushes anchoring the massive circular driveway. She parked and sat in the car, taking in the stately home until she saw Reggie dart out of the front door and down the steps toward her. His concern was evident as he popped open the driver side door.
“I told you yesterday to let me wrap your ankle. You refused and now look at you.”
“Reg, could we not do this? I need your help, please. I’m in pain and the ball is in two days. I need to get into my shoes.”
Reggie shook his head while extending his hand and helped her from the car. “So some high heels made you come to your senses. You absolutely have the hardest head, Carrah Andrews.” He kneeled down and pressed his fingers to the soreness surrounding her foot. “Had you let me properly take care of this yesterday, maybe we wouldn’t be here now… and then Chris wouldn’t be all worried,” he mumbled.
“Chris Chennault, worried about me”—she sucked her teeth—“hardly. He tossed me in the cart like I was a rag doll.” Reggie chuckled, maneuvering Carrah until he became her crutch. “What’s funny?”
He shook his head in laughter as they began making way to the steps of his home. “You were being quite ornery. I mean more than your normal. Somebody had to get you off that ankle.”
Carrah wanted to pull away and get right back in her car. She didn’t have time for Mister Goody Two-shoes to criticize her behavior while condoning Chris’s. Except, there was a pair of Valentino heels she was desperate to sink her feet in and strut with the evening gown she’d picked for the ball. She needed Reggie to use all his medical training to help heal her foot. Therefore, she pushed his comment out of her head and hopped on one leg up the stairs, balancing against her human crutch until they got through the front door.
She plopped into the first chair she came to inside Mrs. Caldwell’s opulent foyer. The space was an ode to the Southern gentry, a class their ancestors were excluded from and yet rose above. The scent of honey tickled her nose, redirecting her attention from the old-world charm of Mrs. Caldwell’s blue-and-white porcelain plates hanging on the wall to an oversized pink Depression glass vase. It was full of flowers she hadn’t seen in the Shores since they were teenagers.
“Your mother still grows butterfly bushes?” She pushed up from her chair, waving Reggie off from assisting her, and struggled to make way to the foyer table. She tipped her nose down to the stems and sniffed. “Mmmm… I change my mind, fresh lilac with this,” she said under her breath. “I thought the Florida sun was too much for them?”
Reggie shrugged, chuckling. “I have no idea, Carrah. You really haven’t stopped putting your nose into flower blooms?”
“Occupational hazard, I guess.” She giggled and went back to smelling the flowers.
“As a kid, I thought you sniffing everything was cute. Grown man–physician status, please stop doing that shit before you have an adverse reaction.”
She rolled her eyes at him while keeping her nose in the buds. “How else would I create perfume?” She lifted her head. “People like you think I pick flora because it’s pretty or smells good and then decide to mix. It’s not that simple. I have to be able to distinguish properties, fragrance, and ingredients. In your mom’s arrangement, there are hints of honey and earth, which if paired with verbena, becomes a rich lemon blossom. I doubt it would become a bestseller because no one wants to smell like they’re in a lemon grove. However, it could work for a home fragrance,” she mumbled as her fingertips played at the blooms.
“Well, that was insightful.” He huffed a chuckle. “Still doesn’t change my mind.”
Carrah waved Reggie away at the thrill of rediscovering a flower she had forgotten because it was like being five in the sweet shop. The lighthearted aroma seduced her muse in an unexpected way. In a moment of self-reflection, she realized she didn’t want to mix the essence of flowers in her lab. She wanted to write about them being an intoxicating fragrance that made a man weak in the knees before he kissed all over his lover’s body.
Romantic fiction allowed her to escape her mother’s pain and her own heartbreak. It was why she wrote it. Although if she were honest, it left her with more questions as she came to realize she’d never loved Trent. He had never been a knight in shining armor or Don Juan. Carrah could count on one hand the times he’d sent her flowers and barely recalled foreplay or experiencing pleasure. Intimacy with Trent left her numb.
“Well, what do we have here?” Mrs. Caldwell’s elegant voice nudged Carrah from la-la land. She untied the ribbon from her sun hat, removed her gloves, and then smothered Carrah in a hug that lingered in spicy, yet fruity notes warmed by amber. “Last time you were in my house, young lady, you started a ruckus in the parlor over a card game against Christopher and my son. What brings you here today?”
Oh, that night , she thought to herself of the first party of the summer. Carrah had almost forgotten about the way Chris and Reggie purposely teamed up against her in a game of spades. Their plan was derailed by Peyton’s younger brother, who they paired her with because they thought he was a beginner. To their surprise, the boy’s card IQ matched hers, and together they ran a Boston that effectively booted Chris and Reggie from the table. Needless to say, they didn’t go easy and the trash-talking she instigated made it worse.
“It was all in fun, Ma,” Reggie chimed in. “Carrah’s always been extra in spades. She’s not here for that today. She hurt her ankle yesterday and I was going to take another look at it.”
Mrs. Caldwell’s smile was replaced by mild panic as her eyes scanned the length of Carrah’s leg. “Oh, certainly. Why are you standing up over here if you’re hurt?” She tugged Carrah by the hand, leading her to an empty chair.
“I was admiring your flowers. It’s been ages since I’ve seen butterfly bushes.” She reluctantly went, watching Reggie grin as his mom became an enforcer that allowed him to disappear from the room. “Do you grow them?”
“I do! Only in my greenhouse, though. That flower is invasive and doesn’t do well in natural landscape.” The older woman tilted her head and began eyeing Carrah’s ankle. She stooped down to do her own examination. After all, Mrs. Caldwell had once gone by Dr. Caldwell, until she preferred duties as a mom over being on call by the hospital. “How’d this hap—You know what, never mind.” She huffed as she stood back up. “Let Reggie wrap it good. Ice and elevate, take ibuprofen for the pain. You do that and you’ll be able to get into your heels for the ball.” She winked at Carrah and they both struggled to conceal their laughter.
“How’d you know?” Carrah asked sheepishly.
“Carrah Andrews, in two days the event our kind of people live for every summer in the Shores is happening, and you always come dressed to impress! You have since your debut. Still wish you and my Reggie had formed something beyond him simply being your friend.” The older woman looked Carrah dead in the face.
Carrah had no reply. She and Reggie had been friends for so long and had never thought of each other in that way. Given that he was roughly two years older, he had been the kind, considerate big brother she didn’t find in Beau. Clearly Mrs. Caldwell didn’t see it like that.
Besides, Carrah wasn’t Reggie’s type. He was typically attracted to tall, thin women who valued being a trophy wife over having an accomplished career. It was a known fact that he suffered from generational delusions of being the provider.
“Nah, man. Give me thirty.” Reggie’s voice boomed as he reentered the foyer on his cell phone, ending the awkward moment between Carrah and Mrs. Caldwell. “Carrah’s here now, finally letting me tend to her ankle.”
“Who’s that?” his mother snapped.
Reggie’s face scrunched up at his mother and then he finally replied, “Chris.”
“Oh, hello, Christopher,” Mrs. Caldwell said as if Chris were standing inside her house. Unexpected knots formed inside Carrah’s belly before she watched the woman point at her son and whisper, “Need I remind you that we don’t tell other people’s business in this house.” His mother’s piercing stare lingered until he nodded. “Now, I’m going to get some sweet tea and head back to my garden. I’d take you, Carrah, if you could walk good. Maybe next time.”
Mrs. Caldwell winked. “Make sure it’s wrapped snug, Reg. She needs the compression to drain the swelling.”
“I’m aware.” His gruff response was followed with a frown that only Carrah saw as his mother sauntered off. “I’ll message you when I’m on my way,” he said back into the phone. “Yeah, I’ll tell her.” Reggie ended the call then slid the device in his pocket.
He dropped down to one knee in front of Carrah and opened a large first-aid kit. A few minutes passed with him kneeling in front of her adjusting a pad under her anklebone before he pulled tape to start wrapping. While she was grateful for his care, patience was never exactly her MO.
“Tell me what?” she finally asked, schooling her voice to appear as nonchalant as possible when deep down she was curious to know what her nemesis had said.
Reggie grinned. “Doesn’t matter.” He huffed a slight chuckle while pulling the tape in a figure eight around the bottom of her foot. “Let’s just say you may have managed to crack that hard-ass’s wall.”
Why did he say sorry, again? Chris pulled the phone from his ear and threw it onto his desk. Carter’s unexpected confession of the kindness Carrah had shown him and how she’d lifted his spirits in the absence of their mother made him vulnerable.
In two days, his little brother would escort one of the South’s most promising debutantes into society, like he had, and their mother would not be there to see it. A stuttering breath escaped him as the memory of his mother ached. Claudette Chennault hadn’t lived to see her youngest son’s rite of passage, which she’d carefully orchestrated to ensure the prestige associated with her legacies remained in high esteem.
In one motion he pushed up from his desk, pressed the button to ring his assistant’s direct line, and said, “Cancel all meetings and no calls for the rest of the week.”
The line went dead and in a heartbeat Shayla was pushing the door to his office open. “What happened? Gerron, Alonzo, MG—”
“Neither. I’m starting my weekend early. My family needs me and I need them. My mother not being here—” He cleared his throat and released a deep breath. “I may look at a few things. Don’t expect any emails or calls.”
“Understood. Is there anything I can prep for you?”
Chris looked around his makeshift office then down to his desk. Under a stack of papers he spotted the one folder labeled SERAPHINA CHARLES . Odd, he’d given it to Shayla the other day. She must have put it back.
Regardless, he still refused to accept the guilt that had attempted to latch on to his conscience from the second he witnessed Carrah fall to the ground. It taunted him in a way he’d never experienced before. In the same way his curiosity was now at work. Was there any escape?
“Nope,” he answered Shayla—and himself—as he reached down and grabbed the manila folder and its attached documents and placed them in his bag. “I’m good.” He proceeded to shut his computer down before snatching up his car keys.
As soon as Chris began moving toward the door, his office line started ringing. Shayla shot past him and answered the phone. She quickly relayed his out-of-the-office status, scribbled a message, and then set his desk phone to auto voicemail.
After which she stopped at his side and offered the Post-it she’d taken the message on. “You can deal with this when you get back. Sounds like they’re finally ready to negotiate.” Chris nodded, accepting the message, and then said goodbye as he left the office.
Once out in the fresh air, he relaxed as he strolled to his car and opened the door. He tossed his briefcase on the passenger seat, shrugged out of his suit coat, and rolled up his sleeves before climbing into the driver’s side. The sense of relief that washed over him as he backed away from the parking space was unexpected. Spontaneity took over, and instead of turning right to bend the curve and cruise down Lakeshore Drive to where his family estate stood nestled on millionaire row, he took a left.
He skipped the fame and fortune for simplicity, crossed over some train tracks, and journeyed to where his great- grandfather had settled their family long before he built the family’s summer compound. Roughly thirty minutes into the drive, the wheels of his Bentley Continental met the old dirt road leading to his grandfather’s fishing cabin, and he regretted not being in his Jeep Renegade. It was made for the rugged, outdoorsy life. More than that, it was a symbol of freedom and adventure, which were all he ever experienced when he came here.
When he stepped out of the car and took in the nature surrounding him, he texted the guys a rain check, and all regrets faded. The anxiety he had been desperate to escape retreated and his mind settled. Only, the normal urge to suit up into fishing gear and cast a line was replaced by an impulse to look beyond Carrah’s shenanigans and read what Hurston House wanted. He went around to the passenger side, grabbed his briefcase, and then went inside.
He would thank Ms. Watson later for prepping the cottage. He had not yet made it over since arriving into town and it was clear she’d come to ensure that, when he did find time, it was ready. After he settled in, he carefully pulled Carrah’s manuscript from his bag.
“ My Soul Remembers ,” he whispered to himself, reading the title. The hairs on his arms stood up as he slumped into the couch and traced a finger over her pen name, Seraphina Charles.