The House on Blackberry Hill: Jewell Cove #1 (Jewel Cove) (27 page)

Abby did know. “I hope I’m not that way,” she mused. “I can take care of myself.”

Jess smiled. “Yes, you can. I think we all realized that the moment Tom put his foot through your veranda and you called Bryce. But you miss the point. Just because a woman is self-sufficient doesn’t mean she won’t make a man
want
to take care of her. Two very different points of view.”

“You think Tom wants to take care of me?”

Jess sent her a knowing look. “I think Tom wants to take care of everyone. And I think the fact that you don’t necessarily let him is good for him. I wish you’d reconsider. Even if you sell the house, I wish you’d stay. You belong here.”

Abby swallowed thickly. “I can’t.” The truth was, she didn’t know how to really belong anywhere. She’d learned at a very young age to rely on herself and no one else. At least that way she wouldn’t put her hopes—her faith—in any one person and they couldn’t let her down.

She blinked as that simple truth slammed into her. If she kept running she never had to get too close to anyone, never have a home to call her own. Neither would anyone have the power to disappoint her. To leave. What would happen if she put down roots here? If she let her heart get involved? Tom would have the power to break it, wouldn’t he? And he probably would. She’d be a fool to let that happen.

“Are you okay?” Jess’s voice broke through her thoughts.

“Yeah, fine, just thought of something I need to do, that’s all.” She forced a smile. “Besides, you probably need to get to the shop.”

“Tom cares for you, Abby. I can see it all over his face when he looks at you. Maybe he doesn’t realize how much, but I wish you’d give him a chance.”

Her words stung just a little bit. “I have my own reasons, too, Jess. I’m sorry.”

“Me, too. Will you promise me one thing, though?”

Oh, boy.

Jess put her hand on Abby’s arm. “Will you promise not to leave without saying good-bye to me? To Sarah? She’s finally told everyone the news and I’m throwing her a baby shower.” Jess’s dark eyes—the ones that reminded Abby so much of Tom—pleaded with her.

Abby’s throat swelled up with emotion. Intentional or not, she’d made connections here. “That sounds like fun,” she replied. “Now scoot. I need to grab some breakfast.”

Jess was gone with a wave.

Inside Breezes, Abby sat alone, listening to the conversations going on around her. One family of tourists was talking about going on a whale boat excursion. A group of ladies were meeting for coffee and animatedly discussing the latest book they’d read in their book club. Abby listened to that one closely, smiling as they debated which hero had more heroic qualities—Darcy or Captain Wentworth. A couple of old-timers were deliberating the cost of purchasing a new tractor and one very pretty young lady was at the counter ordering the makings of a very nice picnic basket. Abby lifted her hand and waved as a few familiar faces came in. The waitress, Linda, brought her a chocolate-filled croissant even though Abby hadn’t ordered it, because she knew it was her favorite.

A pang resonated through Abby’s heart.

Of all the places she’d lived in her adult years, this was the first place that truly felt like a home.

She drained the last bit of coffee from her cup and left a twenty on the table. She was going to miss Jewell Cove deeply. More than she ever imagined possible.

C
HAPTER
18

With the house officially on the market, Abby figured her time to finish going through the final possessions in the attic was limited. She’d already organized the storage room into things for the historical society, things to get rid of, and other items she wanted put into storage. There was just the back corner left—a half-dozen cardboard boxes and one small chest.

The summer heat was cloying in the windowless space, and Abby made short work of the boxes, which contained mostly clothes. Most she would donate, but a half-dozen dresses were particularly pretty and she put them aside, wondering if she dared have them dry-cleaned. Vintage stuff was getting more popular.

But it was the chest that gave her trouble.

It was locked. And she had no idea where to find the key.

She retrieved the ring she and Tom had used to open the servant’s stairway, but none of the keys fit, and she suspected the lock was rather rusted. Deciding to risk injuring the chest, she trotted back downstairs and got a knife and also a claw hammer from a small toolbox she kept on hand. If she couldn’t pick the lock, maybe she could pry it open.

It took ten minutes and substantial cursing, but she emerged victorious with the lock successfully picked. She lifted the lid, an arthritic creak sounding from the old hinges.

Her first glimpse of the chest’s contents was disappointing. She didn’t expect to see a haphazard collection of personal items strewn without any care or organization.

Abby frowned, staring down into the mess. Everything she’d found so far had been folded, wrapped, placed just so. Items had been deliberately and carefully packed. But not this. In the mess she made out a hairbrush and comb, the handle of a mirror. She picked it up and saw half the glass was missing—she’d have to be careful of that. A dusting-powder box was tilted on its side; Abby picked it up, leveled it out, and carefully lifted the pale pink lid adorned with painted lily of the valley.

The soft floral scent rose in the air and she put the lid on her lap so she could pick up the puff. The powder was half gone … Abby swallowed. It was strange. It was like someone had simply dumped the contents of a vanity table into one chest without consideration.

She found the broken mirror piece and set it aside. There was a beaded clutch purse, empty, and a tiny bag with makeup inside—Pan-Cake foundation, an eye pencil, and a tube of brilliant red lipstick. A novel with a bookmark two thirds of the way through—
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
.

It bore all the signs of a life interrupted.

There were hair ribbons and a jewelry box filled with costume earrings and necklaces. A soft velvet bag, heavy—which, when opened, revealed a waterfall of real jewels. A rope of creamy pearls, a teardrop diamond pendant, and an exquisite emerald choker with matching chandelier earrings.

Who in their right mind would pack these away and put them in a corner of an attic? If they were indeed real—and she was nearly certain they were—they were worth a lot of money.

Marian’s things? Or her mother’s?

She went through more of the chest until her fingers touched a leather book cover. She prised it out and brushed off the surface. It had once held a lock, she realized, but the lock and key were missing and the metal hooks were bent at an odd angle, as if they’d been pried open.

She opened the cover.

Diary of Edith Foster, 1943
–

There was no end date.

She turned the yellowed pages, drawn in to the voice of her great-grandmother. It was clear how much Edith loved Marian—the opening pages were filled with daily activities and latest accomplishments. It was equally clear that Edith was not as contented with her autocratic husband, who took a strong view on a wife’s vow of obedience. Abby sensed the relief Edith had felt when Elijah joined up after Pearl Harbor, and how the atmosphere of the house lightened in his absence. Beneath the harsh light of the single attic bulb, Abby drank in the pages describing how the love affair between Edith and the chauffeur blossomed, and how he was kind and gentle, a welcome relief after Elijah’s cold, stern ways. He made her laugh, Edith said, and made her feel beautiful and special. Abby was half in love with him herself as she read on about their affair, the clandestine rendezvous, and the way he snuck peppermints to Marian when he thought Edith wasn’t looking.

And then, in late 1942, Edith had discovered a terrible secret. She’d interrupted a secret meeting in her parents’ barn at the top of Blackberry Hill. She’d been so confused at first, listening to the strange language the man spoke. Then Kristian answered him in the same tongue and she realized she didn’t really know him at all. She made out enough to know that he was speaking German—and that he was talking about the names of different coves and inlets along the coastline.

Abby paused, her hand over her mouth, and then began reading again, turning the pages with crazy speed as Edith confided to her diary that she believed that Kristian, who had come to America from Germany with his parents in 1935, had been tapped by the Nazis to spy on coastal activities in the area.

The barn—the one at the top of the mountain, tilting sideways and abandoned. Good heavens, Abby hadn’t ever suspected something like this. It wasn’t just a simple affair with the help. Edith had found herself smack-dab in the middle of espionage, with her husband off fighting the war and an enemy spy in her bed.

Torn between loyalty to her country and the demands of her heart, Edith wrote how she couldn’t reconcile the Nazi with the man who had been so kind and loving to her and her daughter. Abby frantically flipped through the pages until she came to the entry detailing the night Edith finally confronted him about his allegiance.

Kristian confessed everything: how he was pressured into joining the Nazi party by his parents, how he was trapped spying for a cause he didn’t believe in … and more importantly how he’d turned double agent for the Americans. Abby’s heart broke as she read the smudged lines on the page when Edith described how Kristian made the crucial decision to leave Jewell Cove in order to protect Edith from his double life and took an assignment with the Resistance overseas.

Sailing the Atlantic in wartime was a dangerous proposition, and Edith’s journal was filled with both worry over Kristian’s welfare and the dangerous job he was about to do. Pages of the diary were filled with her despair. Each day Edith prayed Kristian wouldn’t be caught or killed. That one day they would find each other again.

Finally Abby came to one of the last entries in the diary, dated in October of 1943. Edith’s elegant handwriting was cramped and excited. Kristian was coming home. Abby remembered the letter she found under the floorboards in the nursery and smiled thinking about how happy Edith seemed in the diary pages, but as she continued reading, the smile slipped from her face. A scarce month later Elijah came home—wounded, battle weary, and with a changeable temper that made him even more unpredictable.
Elijah is home,
Edith wrote.
Nothing will ever be the same
.

Abby found herself wiping away tears as she read about Edith and Kristian’s tearful good-bye the night after Elijah’s return. Staying and carrying on their affair was too dangerous. No matter what Kristian had done, they loved each other. And if nothing else, Iris had been conceived in love in a world and time filled with hate and intolerance. There was something beautiful about that.

Abby closed the cover carefully and put it on the floor beside her. She’d been through most of the chest now, with just a few items left at the bottom. There was a pair of knitted bootees that were impossibly small, and a pink and white quilt that was the perfect size for a crib, pieced together with tiny stitches. Abby didn’t need confirmation to know that it had been Iris’s, and she put her hand on it, missing her grandmother terribly. Abby lifted the quilt to get a better look and something fell out and hit the floor.

It was a letter, precisely folded and written on pale blue stationery. A letter, Abby thought, that seemed particularly hidden and had never been sent. She handled the pages gently, looked at the elegantly looped handwriting she now recognized as Edith’s.
Mother and Dad
, it said on the outside.

Abby’s fingers shook as she unfolded the pages and began to read.

May 8, 1945

Dearest Mother and Dad,

Please forgive me for saying good-bye this way. If there were any other choice, I wish I could have seen it so I could spare everyone pain. It’s so very selfish of me to choose happiness when I know that choice will make others unhappy. So I’m sorry. Sorry I wasn’t a better daughter, a stronger woman. Sorry if I’ve let you down.

When I married Elijah I thought I was doing the right thing. It was easy to be dazzled by him—rich and charming and smart, and he catered to my every whim. Even then I sensed the kind of man he was and willfully ignored it. Things changed shortly after our marriage. I tried to put a good face on it publicly, but he wasn’t—isn’t—a kind husband. I soon felt trapped in an opulent prison. The one blessing that came of our marriage was Marian. I love her so much and her innocence and enthusiasm for everything reminds me of what I used to be like. The way I hope to be again.

In Elijah’s long absence, I fell in love. His name is Kristian. He is a strong, kind man who makes me laugh. I’d nearly forgotten how, you see. When I am with Kristian, I know everything will be all right somehow. I know having an affair was wrong, but he saved me. He gave me back myself and I find I can’t be sorry for that. He also gave me Iris. I suspect Elijah knows Iris is not his daughter, though he has yet to accuse me of anything.

Today the war is over. It should be a time for celebrating. Instead Kristian is waiting for us at the barn at the top of the hill, waiting for us to arrive, and then we are all going to be together. We are going to leave Jewell Cove and go far away to become the happy, loving family I always wanted and that I know you wanted for me. I want you to remember the good reasons why I’m leaving—for love and happiness and contentment.

I don’t have much time, but I hid a keepsake box in the nursery under the floor. There you will find the letters Kristian wrote to me, a lock of his hair, and his father’s watch that he gave to me before he left last time. Perhaps you can find it and keep it for me … when we meet again.

Tomorrow we’ll be on a ship to a new life. When that happens, remember, Mother—and Daddy—how much I love you. I will think of you both often, and write when I can and share stories of Marian and Iris’s escapades. And maybe one day we can all come back and sit in the rose garden again.