Receive Me Falling (12 page)

“What are tourists to do?
 
There are few options when it comes to
staying on the island.
 
Nearly every
place has “Plantation Inn” in its name,” said Louise.

There was a brief lull in the conversation.
 
Meg felt the color rising in her face, and
didn’t know if that could be attributed to the wine or her shame over these
thoughts never having occurred to her.

“If the government of Nevis or some wealthy
Nevisian could only sponsor its own hotel—one not owned by people from a
thousand miles away, but by the citizens of the island—then Nevisians could
truly benefit from tourism,” said Meg.

“That would be something,” replied Davis, “but there wouldn’t
be any way the government, or even a private citizen, could outbid a foreign
source of capital for land to complete such a project.”

“—unless the seller recognized the significance of
such an endeavor,” said Meg.

“I love your optimism,” said Davis.
 
“Waiter, another drink for the lady.”

The table toasted each other and continued their
feast.
 
The party dispersed at
11:30
, and Meg was home and sleeping
soundly by
midnight
.

The
cell phone woke her up.
 
She ignored the
first call when she saw that it was only 6:30, but by the third round of rings,
Meg knew something must have been important.
 

Brian.

“I’m sorry to wake you, but there’s a problem.”

“What’s wrong?”

“I just got a call from Howard.”

“Dad’s lawyer?”

“Yeah, he said he needed you to call him right
away—something about the estate.”

“Did he mean
6:30
right away, or as soon as possible?”

“Right now.
 
He sounded awful.”

“My God, I wonder what it could be.”

“I don’t know, but he left his number at home—said
you could call him there.”

It
was worse than Meg could have imagined.
 
Simply put, Richard Owen was a thief. Meg’s father had been a
stockbroker and financial planner for forty years.
 
He had a loyal, distinguished, and enormously
wealthy client base, and had been stealing their money for eighteen years.
 
With so many clients worth so much money,
they had never even noticed.
 
It was a
young lawyer Richard recently hired who discovered what Richard had done, and
who had no choice but to report it.
 
He
had tried to be discreet about it, but it didn’t take long for the local papers
to stumble upon the information.
 
The
young lawyer called Howard to explain that the Owen estate would probably be
sued by numerous sources for at least as much as Richard had stolen from
them.
 
The sum of the stolen money that
he was able to track down already totaled in the tens of millions of
dollars.
 
Meg was shaking so violently by
the time Howard was able to relay the information that she had to sit on the
floor.

“Meghan, I can’t tell you how sorry I am to have
to tell you this.
 
Your father was a good
man.
 
There must be some explanation for
this.”

But there wasn’t any explanation—none that would
explain it away, anyway.
 
Meg began
running over her father’s—no, her—estate.
 
One waterfront home in
 
Annapolis,
a restored, historic row-house in downtown Annapolis (where Meg currently
lived,) a beachfront house in North Carolina, two boats, three luxury cars, a
Monet, and the land in Nevis.
 
Howard had
said he would look into the matter and fight it if he could, but he did not
sound confident.
 
He sounded defeated.

Meghan had thought her father the kindest, most
generous man she had ever met.
 
The
charity work, the entertaining, the family vacations—Richard was always doing
something for the assistance or enjoyment of others.
 
That is why he had encouraged Meg to pursue
her interest in politics.
 
He had told
her she could be a public servant, and change the world.

But he was a liar.
 
He had used his best friends’ money to host dinner parties in their
honor, to fund his charitable campaigns, and to take his family on several
vacations a year.
 

And did Anne know?
 
Had Meg’s mother known what was going on?
 
Did she know why she never had to work
outside of the home—that her husband was a crook?

Meg didn’t think it possible that her mother could
have known.
 
She was a devout Catholic—a model
of moral behavior.
 
Anne had always
thought herself a failure because she was unable to have more children.
 
She had devoted all her energy to helping the
underprivileged youth of the community succeed in and outside of school—had set
up Big Brother/Big Sister programs, completed a fundraiser to renovate a
community center in one of the worst neighborhoods in Annapolis, sponsored
parenting classes, tutoring, rec. league basketball, and music programs through
the center, and gave generously of her time and resources to a women’s shelter
on West Street—no, Anne couldn’t have known.

Meg took a deep breath and tried to think. She
paced around the villa trying to decide if she should leave the island
early.
 
Howard told her to stay put until
he learned more, but now she really felt like she was running away from her
problems.
 
She looked over at the picture
of Eden and the
abolitionist pamphlet on the table.
 
If
she did stay, she could work on selling the property.

Without thinking, Meg pulled out her cell phone
and stared at it through her tears. She opened it, scrolled down the list of
saved numbers to her father’s name, and hit
call
.

After four rings, his cheerful voice answered and
told her to leave a message.

Meg dropped the phone and ran to the bathroom to
get sick.
 

The
phone in the villa rang.
 

“Meghan Owen?”

“Yes.”

“My name is Desmond Foxwell.
 
I am with Grand Star Resorts.
 
How are you this morning?”

“I’ve been better.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.
 
We actually met last night—at Miss June’s?”

Meg thought over last night’s introductions.
 
This was not a Nevisian—he had a British
accent.
 
There were a group of British
people at the next table.
 
Meg had
assumed they were tourists.
 
Two of them
were men.
 
One was about sixty, the other
about forty.
 
Yes, he was introduced as
Desi.
 
Thick black hair, blue eyes,
good-looking.
 
Meg had thought he was
pretentious and hadn’t spent much time speaking to him—though now, in
retrospect, she remembered him spending a lot of time looking at her last
night.
 

“Yes, I remember.”

“I have a business proposition for you.
 
Would you be willing to meet with me this
evening for dinner?”

Grand Star Resorts—had he overheard her talking
about the land she owned last night?
 
Did
he want to buy it?
 
In her thoughts, she
suppressed the conversation she had at Miss June’s about outside investors and
echoes of slavery. She didn’t feel good about it, but everything had changed.
  

“Where would you like to meet?” asked Meg.

“The Overlook at The Plantation Inn, say
7:30
?”

“I’ll be there.”

Meg
had made an appointment at the Museum
of Nevis History to
search the archives before hearing of the recent drama concerning her family.
 
Since she had a lot of time before dinner, she
intended to keep her appointment. Meg got into her jeep and drove to the small
building in Charlestown.
 
A plaque on the building announced that it
was the birthplace of Alexander Hamilton.
 
Meg climbed the gray stone steps to the green shuttered door and pushed
it open.
 

           
The museum could be found on the
bottom floor of the Government House of Assembly.
 
The building smelled stale and ancient, and
Meg again wondered at the ability of air to remain in a place for centuries in
spite of its natural flow.
   

           
The Museum was empty when Meg
entered.
 
Archive cabinets and artifacts
lined the walls, and classical piano music played from an old radio behind an
empty desk.
 
Meg cleared her throat, and
a tired looking man of about sixty emerged from a side door.
 

           
“Miss Owen?”

           
“Meg, yes. We spoke on the phone.”