The Art of Inheriting Secrets(101)
Shake it off, I thought, and I dove back into the whirl of the picnic, trying to greet each and every person there. Jocasta arrived and created a stir, but so many of the locals remembered her as a girl that it settled down fairly quickly.
Pavi rushed over at one point, taking my arm urgently. “Jocasta is going to film the restaurant Monday as part of the village segment for Rosemere!”
“That’s amazing! You’ll be famous.”
“I’m so excited and so terrified. She warned me to get ready. I’m going to have to do a ton of work, so I’m probably going to cut out a little early. Will you be all right?”
“Yes, yes, yes. Do whatever you need to do.”
She squeezed my hands, made a little squeak of sound, and dashed off.
A shadow fell across the landscape, and I started.
“Are you all right?” It was Alexander Barber with a slim, tall man in a beautifully tailored suit.
“Yes. Wool gathering, I’m afraid.” I reached for his hands, stood on my toes to give his cheek a kiss. “How are you? I wasn’t sure I would see you today.”
“We’re doing all right. Poor Claudia has the worst of it. She sends her regrets, but she’s really quite broken up.”
“I’ll make a point of going to see her next week if you don’t think it’s too soon.”
“No, that would be lovely.” He turned, drawing forward his companion. “I’d like you to meet my partner, Joshua Gains. He’s an art dealer in the city.”
“It’s a pleasure, Lady Shaw,” the man said. He had large, pale eyes, and his hair was fading backward from his forehead, but there was a solid clarity in his gaze, and I immediately liked him.
“My mother was an artist, you know.”
“Yes, I’ve seen some of her work. Extraordinary. And tortured.”
I nodded. “Please, both of you enjoy yourselves. We’ve hired some of the best new chefs in the area, and they’re getting rave reviews.”
Alexander said, “If you wouldn’t mind, I’d like a moment, Olivia. Can we walk?”
“Of course.”
He gave his partner a nod, and we headed away from the crowd.
“We’re renovating the gardens,” I said. “Would you like to see them?”
“Yes, of course.”
I led the way. “It really is the most remarkable day. We’ve been worried all week that it would pour.”
“It’s lovely. I haven’t been to the estate before. It lies in quite a pretty spot.”
“What’s on your mind, Alex?”
He stopped at the top of the garden and withdrew two envelopes. “I’ve done some footwork, and it appears there has been quite a lot of surveying and plotting going on over your land here.”
I accepted the envelopes. “Shall I open them now?”
“It would be better to wait.” He tucked his hands behind his back. The sun struck his eyelashes and teased out the gold in his hair, and I recognized again that he was a very handsome, virile man. The ladies of the country would be crushed to discover he had no intention of marrying, at least not one of them. “That information and the parties behind it are in one envelope. In the other is my offer for the estate.”
Startled, I looked up. “Offer?”
“I know you’ve given this your best, and you’ve been so much more successful than anyone expected, but I humbly suggest that it takes a lot of skill and balance to run an estate of this size.”
“I see. And you’re going save me from myself?”
He met my eyes. “It wasn’t meant like that.”
“Well, I’m only a woman. What could I know of what you mean?”
“Olivia.”
“I have no intention of selling. Not to you; not to the silent investors who made an offer on the land via Haver, who seems to have run off with a rather enormous sum; and not to whoever this is”—I waved the envelopes—“who wants to build yet another ugly housing estate.”
“You have my word that I would not build housing estates,” he said. “My goal is to protect and keep the land.”
“That’s good to know. I guess you can just make me a promise, cross your heart and hope to die, and I’ll believe you.” He started to speak, and I raised my hand. “No. It’s your turn to listen.”
His mouth set.
“I am over my head: there’s no question. I may very well fail. But I’m not going to just roll over and let you whisk my inheritance away from me.”
“Very well. I admire your grit.” He nodded. “The offer stands, and if you change your mind, you know where to find me.”
I smiled. “I do.”
With a jaunty salute, he started back to his partner. Standing on the hillock, looking down at the gathering, I felt my skirt rustling around my legs and the breeze dancing in my hair as I watched the gathered number weave together and apart, celebrating new life. New purpose.
No, I would not sell to anyone.
By the time all the stragglers and the food trucks had departed, I was exhausted both from the effort of smiling and trying to remember names and the very physical work of the day. Pavi had packed up by two to return to town, and I stayed to supervise the cleanup.