As You Wish (The Summerhouse 3)

“You’re right. I better go too. The prez is waiting for me.”

“The president? No! Don’t answer that. Just go. I love you.”

“And I love you more. Keep me up to date on this. It’s interesting.”

“I promise.” Reluctantly, they hung up and Olivia went into the garden. Ray and Elise were standing on opposite sides, lost in their own thoughts.

Their silence made it flash across Olivia’s mind that this woman she didn’t know, Dr. Jeanne Hightower, had planned for Olivia to be with them. That would have taken some detailed organization, but it could have been done. As it was, the situation reeked of too much coincidence. An “older woman” was supposed to have been with them, but she’d dropped out. Was it just an accident that Olivia had been asked to accompany these two? She didn’t think so.

“If you’re ready to go, we can leave now.” As she led them through the house, Ray picked up Olivia’s suitcase from beside the front door and followed the women outside. He put the case in her new BMW, another gift from Kit.

Olivia glanced at Ray’s sleek Jag, something more suited for a bachelor than a married man.

He closed the trunk. “I’m getting rid of it and buying an SUV.”

“Girlfriend pregnant?” she said before she thought. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.”

But Ray gave a snort of laughter. “You are Jeanne’s sister. Not yet, but I’m working on it, and I refuse to feel guilty about it. I’ve always wanted kids and my wife isn’t able to have any. If that makes me a bad guy—”

Olivia put her hand up. “I know all about wanting children. And, Ray, I don’t judge. You can say what you want. It’s my guess that the reason Dr. Hightower put you here with strangers is so you can talk.”

Ray groaned. “This is going to be a touchy-feely weekend, isn’t it? Where’s the nearest bar?”

“Not allowed.” She was smiling. “Did you and Elise talk?” She nodded toward the young woman who had politely stepped away from them.

“Nothing but about how pretty the flowers are. I get the idea she came from money.”

“You think?”

Ray laughed. “She kind of oozes it, doesn’t she? What’s her problem? Daddy wouldn’t buy her a jet of her very own?”

“Now who’s judging?”

“Okay, I’ll back off. But it’s my job to quickly figure people out so I can sell them things. For her, it would be Chanel and Cartier. Bet she has a black Amex.”

Olivia didn’t want to reveal confidences, but sometimes assumptions needed to be stopped. “Elise escaped authorities by being locked inside the trunk of Jeanne’s car. No color of credit card would have helped if either of them had been caught. You ready to go?” As she walked away, she called for Elise, who got in the seat beside her, and they left for the summerhouse. When she looked in the rearview mirror, she was glad to see that Ray still wore a look of astonishment. Good! Looking at someone else’s problems often helped you solve your own.

* * *

It wasn’t until 3:00 p.m. that Olivia was able to get away from her housemates. She had driven onto the grounds of Camden Hall, Elise beside her, Ray in his sleek car close behind. At the gate, Young Pete—past eighty years old—waved them in and Olivia went left to what had been the gardener’s house. There was a plaque on the door that read Diana’s Cottage. She figured it was probably named after Diana the Huntress. Her mother said there had once been pheasants on the property, so maybe the little house had belonged to the gamekeeper.

Whatever it had been, the cottage was now so cute it almost hurt a person’s eyes. It was stone, with a tall roof punctured by two windows. One of them was round, like an eye watching over the estate. Olivia hadn’t been surprised when Elise wanted the upstairs bedroom with that window. It was small enough to be difficult to see into, but large enough for her to watch for anyone approaching.

Olivia took the second bedroom and was glad she would have her own bath. There hadn’t been any discussion of the matter, but Ray seemed to know he was to stay downstairs.

She was glad to see that the refrigerator and the small pantry had been fully stocked, and wondered who’d done it. Jeanne, who owned the cottage? Or had Kit called someone and asked them to do it? Olivia was learning that her husband had become a person who made others jump to do his bidding.

It hadn’t always been that way, she thought. When they’d met, he’d been a boy of nineteen, and all the world had been a wonder to him.

By the time Olivia got her housemates settled, all she wanted to do was escape. Ray looked like a bull with four red flags being waved at him. Now that it was time for him to start making his decision, he had no idea where to begin the process.

As for delicate, ethereal-looking Elise, for all her pretending that being signed into a mental ward and escaping inside a car trunk didn’t bother her, she’d gone around the house pulling the shades down. Even with that, she sat on the far end of the couch, a pillow on her lap, and kept looking toward the back door as though she were ready to run through it.

Olivia nearly ran outside, then stood there for a moment breathing in the fresh air. Did she really and truly want to take on these two needy...well, children? Big Ray with his wild-eyed looks. Tall, fragile Elise with eyes that darted about the room. Could she deal with them?

She’d had to reassure Ray that he could indeed make a sandwich all by himself, and had to show Elise that her bedroom door could be bolted. Olivia tried to calm herself and look around. She was standing on a pretty flagstone terrace that was in a little garden with a short wall around it. She had an idea that the area had once been used for vegetables, but now had only a few shrubs. Surrounding the little enclosed garden were trees that needed pruning.

Beyond that was a tall stone wall that encircled the entire property. Everyone in town knew that in the spring Young Pete hired brawny high school kids to assess the winter damage and repair the old wall. “Roofs and walls,” he said. “That’s the key to maintenance.” Nowadays, he rarely left the grounds that his family had looked after for three generations. Old Pete, Pete, Young Pete. No one in the next generation of the family wanted anything to do with taking care of some old houses.