Loveknot

CHAPTER TWO

ALYSSA STOPPED the car at the top of the hill above the boathouse where her daughter and son-in-law, Liza and Cliff Forrester, made their home. Smoke curled lazily from the chimney of the rustic building, built to complement the lodge, nearly hidden from sight by the trees. When Judson had decided not to sell the boathouse along with the rest of Timberlake Lodge, Alyssa hadn’t been sure she approved. But now she was glad the property had stayed in the family, even though the private drive lay inside the lodge gates and one of the hiking paths ran past where she was parked, increasing, however slightly, her chances of running into Edward Wocheck every time she visited her daughter and her grandchild.

She rested her head on the steering wheel for a moment, trying to restore her composure so that Liza wouldn’t ask too many awkward questions about her state of mind. Her relationship with her volatile offspring had improved a great deal since Liza’s marriage to Cliff, but it still wasn’t the easy mother-daughter camaraderie she shared with Amanda, or with her son Jeff’s new wife, Cece.

Cliff’s pickup was gone, but Liza’s white classic Thunderbird convertible was parked at the top of the path leading down to the lake. Alyssa sat quietly a moment or two longer. Her confrontation with Edward, coming so close on the heels of her unsettling conversation with his father, had upset her more than she wanted to admit.

If she hadn’t been desperate to put the unanswered questions about Margaret’s death out of her mind she would never have been so tactless as to ask Edward for a loan for Ingalls F and M. And to add to everything else, the man still had the power, in his mere physical presence, to totally unnerve her. What must he think of her? That her business skills were woefully inadequate? Most likely that her common sense was lacking as well.

It was hard to concentrate on business concerns, no matter how important, when your thoughts were tangled in nightmare images of the past. What was in store for her family, for herself, if she remembered completely what had happened that night? What if she recalled the shadowy figure leaving her mother’s room to be her father, after all? What should she do? And worst of all, what if she remembered beyond all doubt that she herself was responsible for her mother’s death?

Alyssa got out of the car and hurried down the path, anxious to hold her new granddaughter in her arms. Margaret Alyssa’s warmth and sweet baby softness were just what she needed to dissolve the terror and uncertainty in her heart. Unconsciously she began to smile, picturing little Maggie’s already vivid blue eyes, and imagined herself coaxing a still-uncertain smile from the wee one.

“Excuse me.” A man was standing at the top of the ridge, at the intersection where the hiking path joined Liza and Cliff’s approach to the boathouse. He was older, balding, carrying a fishing pole and tackle box, and was dressed in Land’s End outdoor wear. He was also about fifty pounds overweight and breathing heavily from the climb. “Can you tell me the shortest route to Timberlake Lodge? I seem to have taken a wrong turn somewhere.”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to go back the way you came,” Alyssa said, unfailingly polite. “Or you can walk along the driveway. It’s longer, but you won’t have to climb the hill from the lake again.”

“Yes,” he said, looking over her shoulder at the steep climb. “I think I’ll take the road. Are you a guest at Timberlake, too? Or are you native to these parts?” He smiled, showing teeth too straight and white to be real.

“I live in Tyler,” Alyssa said, shoving her hands deep into her pockets. The low November sun had gone behind the trees, and the damp, late-afternoon chill quickly penetrated her unlined coat.

The man nodded and smiled again. “I thought so. I’ve been at Timberlake the past five days. Figured I would have seen you somewhere around the building in that amount of time. My name’s Robert Grover. I spend most of my time in Florida these days but I still call Chicago home. Thought I’d come up here and try my hand at bagging a few pheasants and some pan fish before the lake ices over.” He transferred the fishing pole to his left hand, holding out the right one for Alyssa to shake. “And your name is?” he asked, waiting expectantly.

“Alyssa Baron.”

“Baron? That name rings a bell.”

“My husband’s family has lived in Tyler for many years,” Alyssa said, unable to be rude enough to walk away from the man but reluctant to continue talking to him.

“No, that’s not it.” He was still smiling. “It’s something else. It’ll come to me in a moment.” He snapped the fingers of his free hand. “Now I’ve got it. It’s the trial. I read your name in the Tyler Citizen. You’re…” He stopped abruptly and a red flush, almost the same color as the down vest he was wearing, crept up over the collar of his khaki shirt. “You’re Judson Ingalls’s daughter. Sorry,” he said, looking uncomfortable. “I have a bad habit of doing that. Running off at the mouth.”

“Don’t apologize,” Alyssa said, taking a step past him.

He shifted position slightly, unintentionally blocking her way. “I read about the trial in the Chicago papers, too.”

“Yes, I know.”

“Maybe that’s partly what made me come up here when my doctor told me to take it easy for a few days.”

“Maybe it was. If you’ll excuse me.” Alyssa smiled a polite dismissal.

“Or maybe it’s because I wanted to see what Timberlake looked like all spruced up. I remember being here in its heyday.”

“You knew my parents?” Alyssa asked, intrigued despite her reluctance to keep talking to the man.

“Never met your father,” Robert Grover admitted. “I knew your mother, Margaret, though. Lovely woman.”

“You were her friend?”

He shook his head. “Just an acquaintance. We had mutual friends. I came here once or twice for parties. Your mother certainly knew how to entertain.”

“Yes, so I’ve been told.”

“I suppose you have,” he said more to himself, it seemed, than to Alyssa. “Margaret Ingalls was a very beautiful woman. She had charm and sex appeal, what they call charisma today. I was twenty-three years old. Looking back, I realize she couldn’t have been more than five years older, but to me she seemed a real woman of the world. She could certainly turn a man’s head.”

“I remember very little of her,” Alyssa heard herself say. Perhaps this garrulous, harmless old man was someone she could talk to. He had known her mother, but he was a complete stranger, an outsider without an ax to grind. Could she use him as a conduit to the past? He wasn’t involved. Surely he couldn’t share Tyler’s prejudice against her mother.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said, frowning. “She was a remarkable woman.”

“I—I’d like to know—”

“Mother? Is that you?” Liza called from somewhere down the path.

Alyssa left her thought, and her request for more information about Margaret, unspoken. “Yes, Liza. I was just coming down for a short visit.”

“I can’t believe you’re AWOL from the plant in the middle of the day.” Liza was laughing and a little breathless as she came into view. “You’re turning into a real company man.”

“It’s been nice meeting you.” Alyssa smiled at Robert Grover before turning away to greet Liza, though he made no move to leave. “Hello, Liza,” she said. “Hello, Margaret Alyssa.” Her granddaughter was riding in a denim carrier, snuggled warmly against her mother’s chest, a soft, woolly blanket covering all but her face.

“Hi, Mom. We’re just on our way in to Tyler to do some shopping at Gates.” Liza abruptly stopped speaking when she saw the man standing at Alyssa’s side. “Hello,” she said, studying him with a bright, assessing gaze.

“Liza, this is Robert Grover. He’s a guest at Timberlake and got confused about which path to take back. Mr. Grover, this is my daughter, Liza Forrester, and my granddaughter, Margaret Alyssa.”

“How do you do, young lady?” Robert Grover said to Liza with another big smile that revealed his expensive bridgework. “That’s a fine baby you’ve got there.” He nodded approvingly at Margaret Alyssa, but made no attempt to touch her.

“We think so,” Liza said, giving the top of her daughter’s head a quick kiss.

“I won’t keep you if you have errands to run in town.” Alyssa hoped her disappointment didn’t show. She’d seen so little of her granddaughter during the weeks of Judson’s trial, and missed her terribly. Little ones changed so quickly. She was afraid she might miss something new and remarkable in Margaret Alyssa’s development if she stayed away too long.

“It’s nothing important. I’d much rather go back to the boathouse and have a cup of tea with you,” Liza said, apparently reading her thoughts.

“That would be nice.” One of Margaret Alyssa’s little hands wiggled out from under her blanket. Alyssa reached out a finger and let the pink baby fingers curl around it.

“Well, I’d best be moving on or it’ll get dark on me before I get back to the lodge,” Robert Grover announced. “It’s been nice meeting you, Liza.”

“You, too,” Liza replied in her usual breezy style.

“Thanks for the directions, Mrs. Baron,” he said with a courtly nod. “I’d like to buy you a drink or a cup of tea someday if you have time, to show my appreciation.”

“That won’t be necessary,” Alyssa began automatically.

“We could talk about old times,” he said.

“I—I’d like that.”

“Good.” He didn’t elaborate on the invitation, however. Alyssa felt a quick stab of disappointment. “Until we meet again.” He shifted the fishing pole back to his other hand and started up the path.

“What a funny old man,” Liza said in her clear, carrying voice.

“Shh.” Alyssa glanced over her shoulder. “He’ll hear you.”

“He looks a little like Santa Claus.” Liza sucked her lower lip between her teeth. “No, not Santa,” she amended. “More like Alfred Hitchcock with a little more hair.”

“He knew my mother,” Alyssa said as they started toward the boathouse, just visible through the trees.

“He did?” Liza kept walking. “That’s interesting. I wonder why Amanda or that damned Ethan Trask never tracked him down. And I wonder if he might know anything that would help Granddad get out of the blue funk he’s been in since the trial ended.”

Alyssa felt another twinge of conscience at the mention of her father. He had no idea she’d come to Timberlake to speak to Phil Wocheck about Margaret today. He’d be even more upset with her if he knew that she’d practically begged Edward for a loan to save the plant. She felt embarrassed color rise to her face and hoped Liza wouldn’t notice. Or if she did, that she’d attribute her pink cheeks to the cold.

“But I suppose if he was Margaret’s friend, he wouldn’t have been one of Granddad’s as well,” Liza continued.

“That’s right,” Alyssa said. “He mentioned he’d never met Dad. He also said he didn’t really know your grandmother very well.”

“But he did spend some time at Timberlake in those days, I take it,” Liza said thoughtfully as they arrived at the staircase leading to the second-floor apartment, where she and Cliff had been living since Timberlake Lodge was sold.

“Yes, but very briefly.”

“Then it might be worth it to take him up on his offer for a drink. He might know something useful. We can’t afford to let an opportunity like that get away.”

“I suppose you’re right,” Alyssa agreed.

“We have to do everything we can to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Granddad didn’t kill her. Having a drink with that old coot doesn’t seem like such a chore. If you don’t want to see him again, I’ll do it.”

“No,” Alyssa said, starting up the steps behind her daughter. “I’ll do it. I’ll talk to Robert Grover again.”

* * *

ABOVE THEM ON THE PATH, Robert Grover watched through a break in the trees as the two women entered the boathouse. So that woman was Margaret Ingalls’s daughter. Luck had been on his side meeting her this way, so natural and innocent. Many years had passed, and she was a grown woman now. A grandmother. There hadn’t been even a flicker of recognition in her blue eyes. But then he hadn’t expected there to be.

He’d followed the investigation and trial of Judson Ingalls as closely as he could in the regional sections of the newspapers. He had wanted to be there when Margaret’s husband was convicted. That was why he’d come to Tyler before the verdict was even in. But it hadn’t worked out that way.

Judson Ingalls had been acquitted, set free. And now people all over this backwater burg were asking the same questions his daughter was. If Judson Ingalls hadn’t killed his wife…then who had?

* * *

“HOW WAS THE TRAFFIC coming up from Chicago?” Edward asked his stepson, Devon Addison, as he handed him a Scotch and soda from the bar in the corner of the main room of their suite. The English butler his ex-wife had saddled him with should have been pouring drinks, but Edward had given him the night off. The man made Phil nervous. Edward was going to have to send him back to England, whether Nikki liked it or not.

“It was a bitch out around the airport, but once I got north of the city, it was pretty easy going.” Devon propped one hip on the back of the sofa and took a long, appreciative swallow of his drink. “Good stuff,” he said with a satisfied grin.

Edward was proud of his stepson. He’d been eight when Edward married his mother, and well on his way to becoming an incorrigible spoiled brat. But after a few monumental battles of will, they’d come to form an enduring friendship, one that had far outlasted Edward’s love for Nikki Addison. He was proud of the way Devon had grown. After college he’d worked his way up from the bottom in the Addison Hotel conglomerate, and now at the age of thirty he was Edward’s right-hand man.

“How are things going here?” Devon asked in turn.

“Good. We had three more reservations phoned in today. If the weather holds till the weekend, we’ll have a full house again.”

Devon chuckled and held up his drink in a mock toast. “You sound just as excited about a full house here, with less than fifty rooms, as you do when it’s the Addison Park Avenue, or the Ritz in San Francisco.”

Edward mimicked the salute. He gave his tall, handsome stepson a sharp glance, then returned his smile. “I do tend to get carried away by this place.”

“It’s a great old building,” Devon admitted. “The kind where the word innkeeper still means what it should. But you know it’s never going to be a money-maker.”

“I disagree. I think it’s got real potential,” Edward said, downing his own Scotch neat. “It’s a concept I’ve been interested in implementing for a long time. But you’re right. The operative word here is innkeeper. Small, European-style facilities within convenient driving distance of major cities. We’ll cater to gentlemen hunters and fishermen, baby boomers escaping for long weekends, families wanting to spend some quality time at reasonable prices. Upscale weddings, conferences—c’mon, Devon. You know the drill as well as I do.”

“I’m studying at the feet of the master,” Devon said with another smile. “No one can sell an idea like you do.”

“I learned everything I know from your grandfather Addison,” Edward said, paying homage in his turn.

“You’ve surpassed your teacher.”

“Flattery will get you another drink.”

“Great.” Devon held out his glass. “Is Phil joining us for dinner?”

“I don’t know. Hasn’t he come out of his bedroom yet?”

“He must know Wellman has the night off. He can’t be using Mom’s ‘snooty English butler’ as an excuse to stay in his room tonight.”

Edward crossed the room to knock lightly on the old man’s door. “Dad? Are you okay? Dinner will be served in fifteen minutes. Aren’t you feeling well?”

“I’m fine.” Phil’s voice was muffled by the heavy wooden door. “I’m not hungry.”

“Are you sick?”

“No.” This time Phil’s voice was stronger. “Let me be.”

Devon was standing at the bar, refilling his glass. He gave his stepfather a quizzical look. Edward shrugged, then asked, “Did he tell you what’s bothering him?”

“He hasn’t been out of his room since I got back from Chicago. Wellman said he was expecting a visit from a lady this afternoon and sent him packing. That’s all I know.”

“Alyssa,” Edward said, more to himself than to Devon. “Dad, let me in.”

“The door isn’t locked.”

Phil’s room was in darkness. Only the light from the sitting room pooling inside the doorway allowed Edward to pick out his father’s seated form.

“Why are you sitting in the dark?”

“It suits my mood.”

“What’s wrong, Pop?” He didn’t often revert to the childhood form of address, but tonight it seemed appropriate. His father had aged a great deal in the past year. First there had been his broken hip. Then the enforced stay at Worthington House, the pressures of the investigation, his grand jury testimony and the murder trial, the memories of the role he’d played in covering up Margaret’s death. And lastly there’d been another move, this time to the lodge instead of back to his room at the Kelseys, where he’d made his home for many years. “Are you sure you’re feeling okay?”

“I’m fine,” Phil answered sharply. “It’s only my heart that aches.”

“You spoke to Alyssa today, didn’t you,” Edward said, as Devon came quietly into the room, carrying a weak whiskey and water, Phil’s usual.

“She is worried about her father.” Phil accepted the drink from Devon’s hand and took a long swallow. He nodded his appreciation as the younger man turned to leave the room. “Don’t go, Devon,” he said. “You are family. You might as well hear this, too.”

As Devon leaned his shoulder against the doorjamb, Edward sat on the edge of the bed. His father’s face was in shadow, and the only clue Edward had to the state of his emotions was the tone of his voice.

“Judson was acquitted of Margaret’s murder,” Edward prompted gently.

“For a man with the pride of Judson Ingalls, that is as bad, worse maybe, then being found guilty.”

Edward nodded his understanding. “I thought Judson looked like hell at the trial.”

“He has let the whole thing affect his mind. I wish to God that I had taken the secret of Margaret’s death to the grave with me.”

“What’s done is done.” Sometimes Edward wondered if his father realized just how close he had come to being implicated in Margaret’s death himself. The old man shifted position and Edward caught a glimpse of the tight set of his jaw. Phil did know. And never had given in to Ethan Trask’s pressure, just as he’d said he would not. Even now, Edward suspected his father hadn’t yet told the whole truth. He took another swallow of his drink.

“Alyssa is starting to remember.”

Edward felt the hair rise on the back of his neck. “Remember what?”