The Saint (Notorious 3)

“I love your family,” she said, cupping my cheeks and kissing my lips. “Almost as much as I love you.”

“Christ, Carter, can we come in?” Tyler yelled through the door. “It’s like a weeping pregnant women’s club out here.”

“Come in!” Zoe cried, tipping back her head and laughing. The full-throated sound made me drunk with love. With affection. For everyone.

Then my family was there, their arms around us both, their love and laughter ringing through my ears. My life. The years away from them had dried out parts of my body, and they were suddenly flush and living again, tingling and painful like flesh waking up.

So much joy.

“Here’s what’s left of the goddamned gems!” Margot cried, and everyone turned to watch her plunk a potted orchid on the kitchen table.

19

Margot grabbed the orchid at the base of the plant and yanked it from its pot. Its fleshy roots dripped dirt like blood.

I shared a wild look with Savannah and Tyler.

“This was supposed to end it,” Margot said. “Get her out of our lives for good. Stop the damned bleeding of money from this family.” She tossed the orchid on the table and from inside the pot dug out a black bag wrapped in tape.

Casual, like it was a baseball, she tossed it to me.

“Consider it a wedding gift.”

“What the hell?” I breathed, my fingers ripping at the duct tape.

Within seconds the blood-red glitter of a ruby peeked out of the black plastic.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Tyler laughed, plucking the palm-sized gem from the bag. He held its crimson brilliance up to the light. “It was in the greenhouse? All this time?”

“Margot had it all along,” Savannah said, and slumped into a chair. “You lied to me.” Her husband, Matt, stroked her hair.

“Margot,” I said through clenched teeth, “you have a lot of explaining to do.”

Margot sat down at the table, all her earlier queenly elegance gone. “I’d been keeping tabs on Vanessa and your father for a long time, making sure they wouldn’t come back into our lives. And, I won’t lie to you—”

“You say that now,” Tyler said, bristling with anger. “But clearly, you’ve been lying to us for years.”

I couldn’t muster up much anger, or frankly, much surprise. Maybe I was just too tired. Or maybe I wasn’t surprised by my family anymore. I wrapped my arms around Zoe, wondering how much worse this was going to get.

“I won’t apologize,” Margot said, her cheeks red and her eyes flashing.

“My father spent seven years in jail,” Matt said. “You owe someone some apologies.”

The fire banked in Margot’s eyes, and a lifetime of regrets, anger, desperation, all poured out of my grandmother.

“After I heard about Vanessa approaching you in that breaking and entering case,” Margot said, looking at me, “I realized that no amount of money was going to keep her away. So I waited for the perfect chance to get rid of her. Three years later I heard that Richard had been approached about the casino job. It didn’t take much to leak some information to Vanessa, who I knew wouldn’t be able to resist being at the drop-off site, hoping to get in on the action. The plan was to have both of them arrested and out of our hair for a long time.”

“Instead, Dad vanished, Mom vanished, and Matt’s dad was arrested,” Savannah cried.

“That wasn’t my fault,” Margot said. “All I did was give Vanessa the information she needed to be there, and I knew she would take care of the rest. Once Richard saw Vanessa, I left—”

“Were you there?” I asked.

“Of course,” Margot said, and Tyler laughed.

“Of course she was—an eighty-year-old grandmother in a biker bar in Henderson. Makes perfect sense,” Tyler breathed.

“I had to be sure it worked, because I knew I wouldn’t get a chance like that again.”

“Unbelievable,” Tyler muttered. “Un-freaking-believable.”

“Richard left the jewel case with Joel, Matt’s father, but Joel wasn’t a thief. He wasn’t even a crook. He was just a guy who knew casinos, so Vanessa made an easy mark of him. She managed to get the emerald out of the case, but once she heard the sirens, she slipped it into Joel’s pocket and left out the back. In the chaos, I grabbed the case and tried to get the emerald out of Joel’s pocket so he wouldn’t get in trouble, but there was no time.”

“Did you call the cops?” Savannah asked, and Margot nodded.

“I’m sorry, Matt. I am. I didn’t mean for your father to get arrested,” Margot said.

“I’m so sorry, Matt,” Savannah whispered, her hand tugging on the edge of his T-shirt.

Matt stroked his wife’s hair, his smile so tender it made me glad my sister had found such a man. “Dad knew the risk when he got involved,” Matt said.

“Mom broke into the greenhouse,” Tyler said. “And I searched this place top to bottom and only found the diamond. What were you doing? Moving the gems around?”