All or Nothing (42 page)

“What about this one?” Zach asked, turning instead to a photograph of tribesmen, their faces each telling a thousand stories. “How'd you guess I'd love this book?” he asked.

“I had a couple of hints,” Jimmy said, then looked toward Maralys. She tried to look angelic and failed, then the two chuckled conspiratorially together.

“Hey, I was going to ask if you ditched those old magazines of mine,” Zach asked Matt.

“No, they're yours. They're still in the attic.”

“Maybe I'll pick them up one of these days.”

“Jeez, the floors will probably rise a couple of inches once all the weight is removed,” Matt teased.

“The house will be lopsided,” Jimmy said and everyone chuckled and they moved to the next gift in the lottery.

There were lots of laughs as the gifts were opened. None of them were enormous but each seemed a perfect choice: the gifts showed a thoughtfulness that Zach hadn't known his family members possessed, as well as a familiarity with each other's tastes that was surprising. Leslie had even wrapped a box of European chocolates for Jen to ensure that she felt included. It was easy and comfortable as holidays had never been at Grey Gables in Zach's memory.

Finally Matt unwrapped the Mont Blanc pen that Zach had chosen for him. He smiled as he held it aloft and everyone made approving noises.

“I thought every writer needed one,” Zach said and Matt grinned.

“I suppose you'll want me to be waving a publishing contract around soon,” he said.

“No excuses left,” James teased. “Not with the pen.”

“All the words you need are packed right in there,” Maralys said. “All you have to do is coax them out.”

“That's all?” Matt said with a laugh. He turned to Zach. “It's great. I've always wanted one of these and I like the burgundy.” He turned the fountain pen in his hand, testing the weight and Zach could see his admiration. “Thanks.”

A hum of conversation began easily again, and the teenagers disappeared to check something on television. The party spread out again, some people cleaning up the dining room, others helping Leslie with dessert in the kitchen. The three dogs went outside and came back in again, shaking snow all over the kitchen and tracking a bunch of it into the living room as well. They romped around a bit, got told, then laid down with heavy sighs.

“You should come and see what we've done,” Matt said to Zach.

“To what?”

Matt smiled. “You'll see. Come on.” He turned and left the living room, waiting for Zach in the foyer.

Zach offered his hand to Jen. “Want to come along?”

“Where are we going?”

Zach shrugged. “Maybe it's the nickel tour. They might have made some changes to the house that Matt wants to show off.”

“How long is it since you've been here?” Jen asked in an undertone as she walked beside him.

“Not long enough,” Zach said with a smile, then followed his brother.

“What do you mean? It's an incredible house.”

“But it wasn't always a happy one.”

She gave him a serious glance. “It seems happy today.”

“It does. That's why I'm a bit disoriented.” He smiled before she could say anything. “Maybe you've cast some kind of spell on them all.”

Jen laughed, but there was no time to say anything more before they caught up to Matt. To Zach's dismay, his brother headed for the back of the main floor. There weren't many rooms beyond the stairs except the kitchen and there was one room that Zach really didn't want to visit.

His father's study had been at the back corner of the house. It had been a cozy room, all dark wood bookcases and chairs upholstered in oxblood leather. There had been a fireplace and a large Persian carpet and French doors that opened to the back of the property. It had always seemed to Zach to be a room from another time, lifted from a Victorian gentlemen's club, whisked across the Atlantic a hundred years before then reassembled for the pleasure of some forebear.

There might as well have been lions at the door, because entering his father's retreat had been forbidden except by invitation. Those invitations had tended to be issued to Zach when he was in trouble and summoned by his father to hear his punishment. The trial always occurred in his absence and he was, as far as he'd ever been able to tell, always guilty.

That wasn't why he didn't want to see the room, though.

His father had killed himself in his study. Robert had stood at his desk, in his military dress uniform, and put his service revolver into his mouth before firing it. Zach knew all of this but hadn't seen the result.

His imagination had done pretty well conjuring images all by itself. If he'd been the one to take possession of the house, he would have barricaded off the study, or maybe the whole corridor, or maybe even had this chunk of the house physically removed. It had to be better than cleaning that up.

But Matt walked straight toward the study, each step making it less and less likely that he could be going anywhere else. When there was no other possible destination and the closed study door loomed at the end of the corridor, Zach halted in the hall. “I appreciate the thought, Matt, but I'm not sure I want to go to Father's study.”

“It's my study now,” Matt said firmly, so firmly that Zach looked at him in surprise.

“You can work in there? After what happened?”

Matt paused, his hand on the doorknob. His smile was rueful. “Are you kidding? I couldn't even come down this corridor for about three months and I never thought I'd willingly cross the threshold again. I was going to therapy—” He nodded to Jen, who was very quiet and still. “I'm sorry, Jen. You've been tossed into the middle of this. Our father killed himself in this room. I discovered his body, which was his intention, and met with a therapist for the better part of this year to deal with the shock.”

“I see,” Jen said softly. “That was probably a good choice.”

“It was less of a choice than a necessity once the nightmares started,” Matt acknowledged. “Anyway, the therapist said it wasn't healthy to have this room here, effectively sealed off. She said it would create its own ghosts if we gave it that kind of power, and that we had to reclaim it from tragedy if we were ever going to live normal lives in this place.” He gave Zach a hard look. “It helped me a lot, and both James and Phil have seen it as well. I thought it might be good for you to see it, too.” With that, he threw open the door.

Zach wasn't hot to cross the threshold, but Jen tugged his hand. “Chicken,” she said under her breath, softening the word with a smile.

“Damn straight,” Zach breathed and she chuckled.

“I promised to protect you.” When she smiled so encouragingly, Zach couldn't resist her. He folded his hand more tightly around hers, took strength from her surety and followed Matt.

“Oh!” Jen said. “It's lovely.”

It was. To Zach's surprise, the room had been completely changed. It might have been in a different house altogether.

The Persian rug was gone, as was his father's desk and the heavy old oak chairs. The dark green walls had been repainted in a caramel color and the bookshelves had been stripped and stained in a honey tone. The floor was polished hardwood and the new rug was black and gold.

The desk looked like something from the 1930's and the swivel desk chair was stainless steel with black leather upholstery. The draperies were lighter and simpler than the old festooned velvet ones had been, just pleated honey-hued cotton.

He walked around, admiring what Matt had done. The room looked bigger and brighter, and had positive feel to it. The fireplace surround had been changed to a bronze Art Deco one, maybe salvaged from somewhere, and a modern painting hung over the mantle. It was elegant and chic, updated but not too much of a contrast with the rest of the house. Zach liked it a lot.

“Was it that bad?” he asked, surprised that they would have had to get rid of all the furniture.

Matt shook his head. “No. There are services that clean up crime scenes after the police are done, and they did a pretty good job. It was just that the room was so evocative of Father and of what he had done.” Matt smiled and shoved his hands into his trouser pockets. “I had to kick out his ghost, and you can believe that half-measures weren't going to evict him from here.”

Zach smiled. “No, I'd bet not. This is amazing.”

“It's very bright, but warm, too,” Jen said, running her fingertips across the top of Matt's wood desk. “I can imagine that it's a good place to write.”

“It is,” Matt said. “I can pull back the drapes and the room is filled with sunshine. You can see all the trees behind the house and hear the birds when the windows are open. Or at night, with a fire, it's good too. It's quiet back here and I can put some jazz on the stereo and be in another world.”

“I like when it snows,” Leslie said, having appeared silently in the doorway. “We light the fire and turn off all the lights, and watch the snow fall.” The couple shared a smile that heated the room a bit and Zach imagined that other activities also happened in this room. There was, after all, a couch upholstered in a nubby caramel cotton that faced the French doors.

“You've claimed the space for your own,” Jen said with a smile and Matt nodded.

“Exactly.” He sighed and looked around, then met Zach's gaze. “I hope it doesn't offend you that we're making changes at Grey Gables. It's important to Leslie to make the house her own in some ways, and it was critical to me to reclaim this space from Father.”

“It's not up to me,” Zach said. “It's your house now.”

Matt smiled. “No, until I pay all of you off, it's still in joint possession. Given the schedule we worked out, it's going to take a long time.”

“You'll get there.” Zach shrugged. “You needed to be able to carry the debt.”

“You're right: we'll get there.”

“I think it's good that you're making changes,” Zach said, liking the room more with every passing minute. “Houses shouldn't be museums, Matt. They have to change, to reflect the people who live in them. I like this a lot. I can imagine you here.”

“Thanks.” Matt frowned. “That's not the only reason I wanted you to see this, Zach. I believed that it was my fault that Father killed himself and that's why the therapist said I had address that.”

Zach stared at his brother in shock. “But how could you think that?” he demanded. “It was my fault that Father killed himself.”

“Be serious. I lost the Laforini case that very day—”

“No.” Zach interrupted Matt firmly. “No, it wasn't your fault. It was my fault. I called from New Orleans that night. I called from jail to grovel. I called to ask for help after getting myself into a situation that would demand his attention.” He shoved his hands into his trouser pockets, echoing his brother's pose. “And oh, did I get it.”

“You can't think it was your fault,” Matt argued. “You were thousands of miles away. You'd been gone for a couple of years.”

“No.” Zach shook his head. “You did me the favor of handing out some truth in New Orleans, so let me return the favor.”

“Okay.”

“I finally pushed Father too far: that was what he told me on the phone. I had pot in my possession when I was busted; I was trying to sell some to an undercover cop, if you recall, which was the reason why I did get busted. There was no avoiding the truth about my being the black sheep of the family any longer, and he really let me have it on that phone that night.” Zach frowned in recollection. “I really thought he was going to have a heart attack while we were on the phone. He told me that whatever shook out of my stupid prank would be all my fault.”

Jen came to his side and looked up at him with concern. “So when he killed himself, you blamed yourself.”

Zach took her hand. “It was only logical.”

“But wrong,” Jen said. “Suicide is a personal choice.”

“Maybe he was fed up with all of us,” Matt said. “He gave me an ultimatum when he summoned me here to meet him. He said we'd never talk about the Laforini case again if I came, which sounded like a pretty good deal. I had no idea that he meant to kill himself while I was driving out here to make that be true.”

Jen looked between the two of them, her eyes wide and her expression horrified. Zach thought a bit late that she might conclude that insanity ran in his family.

“Our father was battling depression,” James interjected, stepping through the doorway. Zach could tell from his expression that he'd been listening, that maybe he'd followed along to check on things like the big brother he was proving to be. “Robert didn't ask anyone for help. He simply solved the issue as he saw fit and left all of us blaming ourselves for what he had done.”

“Well, that's not unreasonable,” Beverly said, appearing behind James. “I did leave him and insist upon a divorce, which he found very embarrassing. It certainly put an end to his political ambitions and it wasn't foolish for me to think myself at least partly responsible for Robert's choice.”

“You don't anymore,” James asked and Beverly shook her head.

“No. But Robert had a talent for ensuring that everyone felt guilty for his own choices.”

“And he didn't like me marrying Nick,” Phil said, easing her way into the room, as well. She bounced her baby on her hip and nodded at Jen. “My father had firm ideas of which kind of people counted and Nick's family, the Sullivans, weren't on his list.”

“But you married him anyway,” Jen said with approval.

Phil's lips curved. “I was too much in love to do otherwise.”

“Good for you.” Jen and Phil smiled at each other in complete understanding. Zach watched and hoped that meant that Jen might be feeling at least a fraction of what he felt for her.