Losing Penny (21 page)

Drake’s expression said that he didn’t
believe her, but he continued, “When Simon saw the manuscript, he
had a clear vision of women with spinning wheels, Viking men on
sailing ships, and a tiny scribe sitting in a cold cell, carefully
penning the legend. In short, Simon fell passionately in love and
had to have the manuscript. Unfortunately, Hannah wasn’t interested
in selling.”

Penny had to bite her lip to keep from asking
about Hannah. She didn’t want to interrupt again.

“Hannah was draped all black and looked like
somebody’s babushka, and she was nasty mean. Her pastor had
persuaded her to display her personal antiques, so the manuscript
was just for show. It had been in their family for generations, and
she had no intention of selling it, or even letting it out of her
sight. As the last surviving member of her family she was the only
keeper. That’s what she called herself—the keeper. Her protection
was fierce, but Simon just
had
to have it. He made generous
offers, and he wheedled and charmed, but Hannah would not budge.
Then a miracle happened.”

Penny turned the car onto Lake Shore drive.
She wanted to ask Drake if he believed in miracles, but she stayed
quiet and saved her questions for later.

“Simon hadn’t forgotten Hannah and her
manuscript. He called her several times to try and tried to reason
with her. Then one day he decided to go and visit her. When he
arrived he saw an ambulance parked in front of her tiny row house.
Paramedics wheeled old Hannah out, a neighbor followed behind the
gurney, and another lingered on the sidewalk. Just before a
paramedic slammed the ambulance doors, Hannah looked straight at
him and crooked her finger.”

“Simon didn’t know if it was an invitation or
a challenge, but he accepted it. As soon as the emergency response
people had gone, he went around to the back of the house and broke
in. He found the manuscript inside an ornately carved box,
obviously created specifically to house the manuscript. He slipped
the box under his raincoat, and walked out with it. He wasn’t
stealing it, mind you. He was just going to read it then return
it.

“He and Charlotte argued bitterly over his
theft of the manuscript; Charlotte was unflinchingly honest. Simon
tried to explain Hannah’s last look, her crooked finger, his
intention to return it, but Charlotte was unrelenting.

“She was offered an opportunity in South
America and she took it. Simon tried to return the manuscript to
Hannah, but she was gone. Her house was empty. Simon’s life in New
York became a hell. He developed boils, his business went sour, and
he lost everything. Simon tried to contact Charlotte, but she
returned his letters unopened. And every night he had the same
nightmares with spinning wheels, Vikings, and sea monsters. Simon
thought he was going insane. Perhaps he was. Eventually, forced by
financial pressures, Simon tried to sell the manuscript, but no one
wanted to buy it without knowing its history. Of course Simon
couldn’t tell its history without exposing how he had gotten the
manuscript. A potential buyer suspected Simon’s dishonesty and
threatened to go to the police. Simon was frantic. One night he
became drunk and doused the box with liquor and set it on fire. The
box wouldn’t burn, but his apartment did. He was cursed.”

“Simon left the box in the ashes and ran to
South America searching for Charlotte. After a grueling trip by
boats and buses filled with chickens and goats, he finally tracked
Charlotte to a tiny fishing village in Southern Chile only to be
told that she had died during a fishing excursion. After many
years, Simon returned to the U.S. to find Charlotte very much alive
and well in Rose Arbor.”

“Only she wasn’t well,” Penny said.

“No, she was insane.” Drake took a deep
breath. “Sometimes I think that if I don’t write the Viking story,
I’ll go insane, too.”

“Really?”

He smirked. “No, not really. I just tell
myself that so I won’t be embarrassed by writing drivel.”

Penny parked the car in the drive and gave
Drake a hard look. “I love drivel.”

“I know. I like that about you.”

She reached over and squeezed his hand. “I
like you too.”

***

Penny and Drake fell into a pattern of
writing, cooking, blogging, and stealing kisses whenever Mia wasn’t
around. Penny also spent the week slipping over to the Bluebird
Café to help Andrea prepare for the party.

Mia supposedly was staying only until Drake’s
birthday, but since she didn’t show any signs of homesickness, but
she showed plenty of signs of a Don Marx infatuation, Penny
concocted a plan on the day of the party.

“Penny,” Drake called from the bottom of the
stairs, “we’re ready!”

In response she moaned dramatically from her
side of the bedroom door. “I’m sick.”

“Sick?”

“Don’t pester the girl, Drake. She’s not
feeling well,” Mia’s voice floated up the stairwell.

“She was feeling fine a few minutes ago,”
Drake muttered. “I’ll stay home with her.”

“She’s a girl, sweetie,” Mia said. “In
ancient Israel when a girl wasn’t feeling well they left her in a
tent for a week.”

“This is Rose Arbor, not ancient Israel,”
Drake said.

“I’m just saying that sometimes when girls
aren’t
feeling well
they like to be left alone.”

Penny wished she could see Drake and gauge
his reaction, but when he pounded up the stairs and knocked on her
door, she didn’t open it. She had a hard time denying him anything,
so he was easier to resist if she couldn’t see his face.

“Penny? Can I get you anything?”

“No,” she moaned. “Just go.”

“Do you want me to bring you back a plate of
food?”

“Drake, for heaven’s sake!” Mia called from
the bottom of the stairs. “Give the poor girl some peace.”

“How am I not being peaceful?”

Penny smiled, imaging Drake with his arms
tightly folded—no, he’d have his hands on his hips.

“I’ll be fine,” she said. “Don’t bring me
anything.” After spending the day cooking with Andrea, she really
didn’t think she could look at another stuffed mushroom without
actually
getting sick.

“Are you sure?” Drake rattled the
doorknob.

“Don’t you dare open that door!” Mia scolded.
“Haven’t I taught you anything?”

Penny peeked her head out the door and gave
Drake a pained expression. He moved to kiss her, and it hurt to
stop him.

“Cramps aren’t contagious,” he said,
suspicion lacing his voice.

“I didn’t say I had cramps.”

“Then what?”

“Then go.” She put her hands on his shoulders
and tried to turn him toward the stairs.

“I won’t stay long,” he said over his
shoulder.

“Yes, you will. I want you to,” she said,
giving him a gentle push. Leaning against the doorframe, she
watched him clomp down the stairs. After one last look back at
Penny, he headed out the door.

Penny didn’t know how much time she had until
he returned, and she had a lot to do before she executed her plan.
She made a mental to-do list: finish the rewrites and typing,
Photoshop the cover, and print the manuscript out. Of course, it
would have been much more fun to have an actual book to give him,
but her editor had said that the proof would take at least a
week.

She sat down at the computer and opened the
Word document.

The mighty sea roared as if a creature
alive. Billowing waves threatened to sink ship and sailor. The
planks groaned beneath the onslaught, and the wind pitched the ship
first up then down as the vessel rode the steaming tide—

Penny paused, her fingers hovering over the
keyboard. She thought for a moment and then typed,
coming face
to snout with a giant sea serpent.
Uh, no. She had to describe
it like Drake would describe it. She tapped her fingers on the
table as she thought.

With eyes of flame he came whiffling through
the tulgey wood.

Wait, that was
Jabberwocky
, and Drake
was good, but he wasn’t Lewis Carol. She couldn’t tweak some of Mr.
Carol’s words, even if he were a long dead opium addict who
probably wouldn’t have cared even when he was alive.

“Surprise!” The crowd next door cheered.
Laughing and clapping followed and Penny tried not to listen.
Through the stand of trees bordering the Marx property, the lights
from the party sparkled in the fading daylight. The mariachi band
began to oompah.

Penny’s heart hurt. She wished she could be
there, but she told herself that this gift was better. Drake would
love her surprise. They would celebrate with just the two of them,
like they had at the old stone church in the woods.

Afloat and awash in sea’s frothy foam, the
monster appears in his great, green glory.”
Smiling, she typed
it in. Now to find a picture of a sea monster.

The billowing smoke told him that events had
turned even before the ship reached the shore. The cries of
children and the screams of women rose above the sound of crashing
waves, and the acrid odor of burning hair and flesh drifted out
over the tide.

From
Hans and the Sunstone

Lights flashed in
his eyes. Drake blinked rapidly then registered his mother’s bright
smile, Melinda’s laugh, and Andrea’s stunned expression. Drake
caught her sudden comprehension. He didn’t know how she knew about
Penny, but he knew that she knew.

Andrea gripped the back of a chair with one
hand and let go of a platter of bacon wrapped shrimp and lime
slices with the other. The crustaceans and limes bounced around her
feet before landing next to her shoes. He tried to reach her, but
she pushed away, stepping on the shrimpy mess without regard for
her spikey heels. One stiletto stabbed a shrimp and she carried it
away with her. Drake watched Trevor follow her, and he guessed
Trevor was Andrea’s new crush.

Melinda wrapped her arms around him and tried
to kiss him on the mouth. He stiffened in her embrace, but she
didn’t notice. Her lips hit him on the chin.

“Excuse me,” he said, untangling himself from
Melinda and pushing past his mother’s outstretched arms. He found
Andrea in the kitchen, bracing against the table, her head down.
Trevor stood beside her, but instead of comforting her, he was
chastising her. Drake watched from the doorway.

“This is not how you advertise your
business.” Trevor gathered napkins and glared at Andrea. He shoved
a handful at her. “Are you going to clean it up, or should I?”

Andrea gulped and reluctantly took the
napkins from Trevor. She straightened her shoulders.

“I’ll do it,” she said, her voice small.

“What happened back there? Do you know
Drake?”

Andrea nodded. “And
his wife
.”

“I already knew that.”

Andrea shook her head and Drake held his
breath, waiting for Andrea’s next words. “Maggie…where is she?”

Drake exhaled. He needed to talk to Andrea,
but a hand on his arm stopped him.

“What’s going on?” Melinda whispered.

“Kitchen drama,” Drake replied in an equally
low tone.

Melinda blew out an expletive and moved
toward Andrea. Drake stopped her with a hand around her waist.
Stunned, Melinda settled against him, which wasn’t what Drake
intended, but whatever Andrea knew, whatever she had to say,
Melinda was the last person that Drake wanted to hear it. He racked
his brain to try and remember if Andrea had ever met or seen
Magdalena. He hadn’t thought so, unless Blair had stalked him
online. The thought of Blair stalking him didn’t please him the way
that he thought it would.

Andrea looked past Trevor and saw Drake. “You
louse!” She pointed her finger and glared at him.

Drake held up his hands to fend her off, and
Melinda stepped in front of him in full momma-bear-protective mode.
Drake knew this wouldn’t help.

Melinda placed her hands on her hips. “Before
you start slinging insults, I suggest you clean up the mess you
made.”

Andrea’s gaze flicked from Drake to Melinda
and landed on Drake’s hand on Melinda’s shoulder.

“Maggie, or whatever her real name is,”
Andrea inched toward him, wielding the now empty shrimp platter,
“is way too good for you!” She lifted the platter as if to swing it
at his head, but Trevor grabbed her around the waist.

Drake ducked while Melinda grabbed the
platter. Lime and shrimp juice ran down Melinda’s arm making her
scream.

“I agree with you,” Drake said.

Melinda grabbed a washcloth and hastily wiped
off her arm. “You’re fired!” she screamed.

“You can’t fire me. You didn’t hire me.”
Andrea wiggled in Trevor’s arms. “Drake’s wife, whoever that is,
did. Only she can fire me.”

Trevor cut Andrea a quick glance. “Why don’t
we go and talk to her right now.”

“She’s sick.” Drake hated how small and
pathetic his voice sounded. “But if you really think you need to
speak with her, I’ll go with you.”

“You can’t leave your own party, Drake!”
Melinda huffed. She held up her arm and dabbed her underarm with
the cloth, reminding Drake of a chimpanzee. All she needed was a
banana. She tossed the used cloth at Drake. “I’m sticky!”

Drake wondered what
he
was supposed to
do about it.

“Drake!”

His spine stiffened. As if this party
couldn’t get any worse. Drake slowly turned. “Dad, what are you
doing here?”

“Where else do you think I’d be on my son’s
birthday?”

In the boardroom, on a conference call,
closeted with accountants and attorneys…

Malcolm Islington walked down the hall, a
beer glass in his hand and a scowl on his face. Tall, every inch a
successful business man, Drake had rarely seen his dad at a loss or
at a disadvantage, and yet here he was in the house of man whose
wealth superseded his many times over, plus Don Marx had Mia on his
arm. No wonder his dad looked furious. And maybe a little
insecure.