Project Reunion (43 page)

I gazed up in awe from the foot of those steps. The brownstone looked perfectly renovated, in loving detail, better than its New York Knickerbocker glory days of centuries past. Three and a half stories high – the lowest servant floor sank below street level – plus crown molding. The front bowed outward to either side of the central stairs, curved to provide bay windows for the interior. There were elegant moldings and fiddly bits everywhere, and a painted cast-iron railing.

The brownstones weren’t actually brown. The set of three were painted in sandy shades of cream, rose, and tan.

“Did you say ‘house’?” I inquired. Before, such a double-wide brownstone would likely have been split into a dozen apartments. Really expensive apartments at that. A whole brownstone…

“Last sold for twenty-eight million,” Emmett supplied. “It’s nice.”

“Nice,” I echoed faintly.

He nodded dismissal to our guards and headed up the steps. A middle-aged apple housekeeper opened the door for us before we reached it, and curtsied us in.

The house was even more gorgeous inside. A golden wooden staircase rose in front of us. To its left, a formal dining room. A formal living room to the right, gleaming with wood from floor to chest height on me. Above the paneling, creamy plastered walls rose to ceiling molding. True to Emmett’s taste, the room capitalized on its polished bare wood floor. An unfussy conversational grouping of beige leather couches and chairs formed a small island around a fireplace.

Emmett immediately kicked shoes onto a shoe rack, and ripped off necktie, jacket, and dress shirt just as quickly as he could peel them off. His undershirt was sopping with sweat, as was his hair and every other part of him, probably. That dress uniform was not ideal for a summer day. And it wasn’t much cooler indoors. The beautiful windows were all wide open.

“Will sir need his uniform again today?” the maid inquired, taking his cast-offs.

“No, thank God,” Emmett replied. “We expect four more guests for dinner tonight, Gladys. Six total. Casual, something light. Out in the garden, I think. They should arrive in an hour. Maybe later.”

“Yes, sir. Perhaps a salad nicoise. And will madam need the dress again today?” she asked.

“Please, call me Dee,” I invited with a smile. I’d never had someone speak to me in the third person before. It was creepy. Especially with a harsh Brooklyn accent. “I don’t have another dress with me. Emmett?”

“Just the Niedermeyers and Camerons tonight,” Emmett explained. “The kids are staying on the yacht. With guards.”

“Oh, nice! I guess I will want my dress then. And salad nicoise sounds perfect. Were you a cook before, Gladys?”

She shot me a look of pure hatred, quickly tamped to pursed lips and eyes cast down to the floor. “I’ll carry this up for you,” she hissed. She grabbed my overnight bag and stomped up the staircase.

“Apples hate it when you ask personal questions,” Emmett observed mildly.

“I think I caught that,” I agreed. “What did she do before?”

“Never asked. She hasn’t volunteered a word about herself. Just, ‘Gladys.’ She does a good job.”

“That is so weird,” I complained.

“Some things take time, Dee,” he murmured softly.

Emmett pointed and led me toward the back of his fancy new house. Beyond the formal living room, through glass French doors, was a beautiful library, turned into Emmett’s office. He had two computer displays on his huge oak desk, in addition to his laptop and tablet, plus a giant screen on the wall that rivaled my living room display. Extra box devices blinked their LED heartbeats.

I did a double-take. “You have full power and Internet!”

“Cell phones and meshnet, too,” he agreed. “Indoor plumbing. Fridge, stove, laundry. Even air conditioning. I just don’t use it.”

“Your library could use some books,” I suggested. Built-in shelves of gleaming wood stretched empty from floor to ceiling.

“Books are easier to burn than trees,” Emmett responded shortly. He continued to the back…garden. Those weren’t just windows at the back of the library. He stepped aside to wave me through another set of French doors, still solemn.

“Oh…” I said, rapt, face breaking into a smile. “You have a tree.”

A strip of deck stepped down into a surprisingly large brick-walled garden. The walls were perhaps 8 feet high. From the deck at the half-story first floor, I could see across the tops of the other gardens filling the core of the roomy block. But Emmett’s garden was fairly private at ground level. It stretched perhaps 75 feet back, as wide as the house, around 30 feet. Near the deck, a modest-sized maple tree cast dappled shade over a bricked lounge area, complete with teak furniture. A narrow lap pool stretched the length of the garden, with plantings in the narrow strip between the pool and the wall on that side. Against the back wall stood a quartet of brick 4x4 planters like the ones on the street, currently barren. I drifted down the long brick walkway to look at them.

“Soil,” I said wonderingly.

“Uh-huh. Not sure I did the right thing there,” Emmett replied. “There was garden soil, but the walls block the sun. Figured higher was better. Maybe room for some chickens, too.”

“It’s gorgeous, Emmett!” I said. I wanted to throw my arms around him. But he remained aloof, leaning with hands on the brick raised planter bed before us. I sat on its edge and looked up at him. “Talk to me, Emmett,” I whispered.

“It’s hot,” he sighed. “Let’s change into bathing suits and get into the pool.”

“In a minute,” I agreed. “What’s wrong?”

It took a minute, and a slow Ozark minute at that. But I waited him out. “Is it good enough, Dee?” Emmett finally murmured. “For you to live here? With me.”

“You want to stay here,” I said, dismayed. “Not just to September.”

“No,” he said. “Maybe. I don’t know. I just want you with me.”

“Emmett, is this an ultimatum?” I asked, eyes narrowed. “Are you breaking up with me, if I don’t move in?”

“No.” He turned to perch on the brick beside me, hands between his knees. “No threats. I love you. I don’t want anyone else. Just want you here with me. Wherever we go next. Please. It’s just too hard alone.”

It cost him to ask, to beg. But if he felt this way, watching Adam’s wedding must have been excruciating. With this house and garden, he’d bent over backwards to please me, to make a place for me, where I wouldn’t hate living in New York. I wasn’t likely to love it anytime soon either. And I doubted I could make friends among the apples. New Yorkers were none too friendly before the epidemic. They seemed downright squirrelly now.

In New York, I’d live under curfews. Never leave the house without armed escort. Socialize with the occupying armed services, separate and above the apple natives, like some bizarre throwback to the British Raj. Enjoy maybe the only tree left in Brooklyn, walled off from the voracious hordes of human tree predators. No more kayaks and beaches, marshes and woods and apple orchards, squirrels and raccoons. Yet.

But there would be.
If I can make him do it, I can damn well watch him do it.

I’d been quiet more than a minute. Emmett sighed defeat. “Never mind.”

“Yes,” I said. “Whatever you’re up to, I’ll face it with you. I believe in you, Emmett.” I squeezed his knee. “Partners.”

“You’ll…?” Emmett asked, daring to look up at me.

“Yes. With you. I love you.”

He clutched me tight. I smoothed his back, his hair. I was afraid for a moment he was going to ask me to marry him right then and there. But no. “Thank you,” was all he said.

“We are leaving in September. Aren’t we?” I asked doubtfully.

“If you want,” he promised. “Gotta warn you, though. I’m pegged as a remediation specialist now. Got offers from all over.”

I laughed. “I bet. We’ll figure it out.”

“Together,” he agreed.

“At least the weather is improving,” I said wistfully.

Emmett sighed. “Don’t bet on that.”

“We made changes in time,” I insisted. “Huge changes. This year hasn’t been so bad.”

“Uh-huh,” said Emmett.

“What.”

“You don’t want to know,” Emmett said.

“Yes. I do.”

“I believe God gave us a break. Because we – the whole Northeast – were willing to save New York.”

I shot him a look that said,
You’ve got to be kidding me.
But what I said was, “It’s better, Emmett. Rain fell in the Dust Bowl. Some.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Tell me.”

Emmett sighed. “We did the Calm Act because we had to, Dee. The facts haven’t changed. We just got a breather.”

My eyes narrowed. “So… Does that mean you’ll choose your next assignment by what you think God wants?”

He grinned crookedly, and whispered in my ear, “You only think that’s not what you love about me.”

“Oy, Emmett!”

“We’ll decide together,” he promised. “And stay together, I hope.”

That wasn’t entirely comforting, I reflected. After all, we’d chosen Project Reunion together.

Welcome to the next new normal.

From the Author

Hope you enjoyed
Project Reunion!
If you want more, I’m writing further installments in the same universe, and I’m eager for beta readers.

Please!

I’d really appreciate a review on Amazon. Reviews help sell books. But also, I’m energized by feedback, to write more, faster, better. Reviews tell me that people care. So please
leave a review
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Acknowledgments

As always, I’m deeply grateful to my test readers. This time around, a thankful shout-out to Andy Berry, Brett Jarman, Barbara Booth, Beth Grem, Rob Kaye, and Julia Novak. Of course, any mistakes are my own.

And thank you, for reading my book. Especially if you’re so kind as to post a review on Amazon, or to tell someone else about it, or drop me a line. Books take a long time to write. Feedback means so much to me.

About Ginger Booth

Ginger Booth is a writer and programmer. She's worked in the seismic industry, semiconductor electronics, academic research in biology and environmental science, and online teaching simulators. She lives in shoreline Connecticut, with crops spilling out the balconies and down the driveway. Contact her online at
books.gingerbooth.com
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Books

The Calm Act series: