The Best I Could (23 page)

I offered him my hand, and he took it. We
shook on it.

He walked away, but I remained and stared at
the ring.

My house. My issues, the good and the
bad.

“Want to spar?” Mouse called, his words
breaking me out of my reverie. He stood to the side of the ring, a
grin on his face.

An answering smile broke out on mine. “Yeah,”
I replied. “Won’t take me long to beat your ass.”

He snorted, heading for the ring. “Don’t
underestimate me.”

Grabbing my gear, I followed him.

The ring. My house. My issues, the good and
the bad.

Tansy

I rolled the window down as soon as I pulled
into the orchard drive, letting the warm, fresh-smelling air
assault me. It combed my hair and stuffed my nostrils full of
honeysuckle and wildflowers.

A bee buzzed into the van when I parked, and
I shooed it out, keeping the window down as I stepped free of the
vehicle, my gaze going to the house.

Pops waited, his daunting figure folded into
a rocking chair, a glass of tea in his hands.

“Do you always do this?” I asked. “Intimidate
the people who work for you?”

“Nothing less intimidating than an old man
with an iced tea,” he called.

Throwing him a look, I walked to the back of
the van, pulled it open, and threw a bag of mulch over my
shoulder.

“I beg to differ, Mr. Lockston.”

“Pops,” he told me, rocking. The chair
creaked, adding a comfortable sound to the ones I already
associated with the orchard.

“Is that the tea with the mint?” I asked,
setting the bag on the ground next to the flower bed before going
for another.

“One and the same.”

“It’s good,” I admitted. “You’ll have to tell
your cook I really enjoy it.”

“Cook?”

Lifting another bag, I
glanced at him. “You don’t have a cook?” My gaze flicked to the
large house. “But that dinner the other night … are you
saying
you
cooked
it?”

Pops laughed. “Hells bells, no. I don’t have
the patience for cooking. That was my wife’s thing, and my daughter
would catch herself on fire just so people would send her sympathy
cards. I had that food catered in. I have all of our food catered
in.”

Dropping another bag of mulch, I paused and
shaded my eyes. “Wouldn’t it be easier to get a cook?”

He continued to rock—back and forth, back and
forth. “I don’t like the idea of servants. Makes me feel too
rich.”

“Well, that’s what you are, isn’t it?
Rich?”

He smiled, the gesture lifting his face. “I’d
probably understand it more if I hadn’t spent most of my life poor.
I don’t have any use for servants. I like my privacy too much.”
Saluting me with his glass, he added, “As for the tea, it comes in
a gallon from this gas station down the road. Seriously amazing.
Add a squeeze of lemon and a sprig of mint, and it tastes just like
the way my mama used to make it.”

I laughed.

Pops’ face sobered. “You are very pretty when
you smile, Ms. Griffin.”

“Tansy,” I told him, “and thank you.”

He returned to his rocking, and I started
splitting open mulch bags with a butter knife I kept in my
gardening tools. It came in handy when digging near roots, and my
gaze kept falling to its edge. The knife wasn’t sharp, but that
didn’t matter. It was all about the pressure applied.

Pops leaned forward in his rocking chair, and
it creaked loudly. “I admit, I’m a little curious about you, Tansy.
All I have so far is that you’re the local vet’s granddaughter, and
my grandson seems to have developed a connection with you in a
short period of time. Oh, and you are very good with flowers.”

“It gets really hot here, Mr. Lockston,” I
replied, redirecting the conversation. “You should think about
planting flowers that can handle high heat summers. Butter daisies,
Lantanas, and Rose Moss are all good choices and very pretty.”

He studied me. “You’re a lot like Eli. The
way you back away from people, but he lets them in better than you
do. He’d never admit it. He likes people to think he’s a crotchety
bastard who couldn’t give a damn about anyone.”

Scooping out mulch, I started spreading it
around the azaleas I had weeded the day before. “This will help
keep moisture in the ground,” I told him.

Pops sat back in the chair, watching me.

I’d gone through three bags of mulch and was
starting a list of flowers to pick up when I broke. It was the
staring that did it, the way Pops studied me like he had all the
time in the world. No one had that much time.

“I’m nothing special,” I said, turning to the
porch. “If that’s what you’re after. I’m just a girl living with
her grandmother, getting up every day to find things to keep me
busy in a place that doesn’t have much busy stuff, and I’m … just
here.”

“Nothing special, huh?” Pops asked. “Come
here, Tansy. I want to show you something.”

He stood, waved me onto the porch, and then
opened the house’s screen door.

Cautiously, I climbed the stairs, placing my
list on the porch railing, before proceeding him inside.

The door slammed shut behind us, startling
me, and I jumped.

“You’ve got nothing to fear from me,” Pops
assured.

He ushered me into a very nice living room,
the space so white, it blinded me. White furniture, light carpet,
and polished wooden accents.

“This,” he said, picking up a framed photo
from the fireplace mantle, “was my wife. Her name was
Charlotte.”

He handed it to me, and I took it, suddenly
extremely aware of the dirt on my hands. “I don’t—”

“I’m not worried about the soil,” Pops
promised. “Just look at it.”

My gaze fell to the photograph. A middle-aged
woman sat perched in a garden, a white trellis arched over her, the
painted wood covered in roses—white, yellow, and red. A myriad of
other flowers grew around her feet. She wore a pair of navy dress
pants with a white and navy striped short-sleeve shirt, and a
crocheted white shawl. She had auburn hair, the strands pulled up
and away from her face, curling softly around two pearl clips. A
smile lit her face, her eyes creased in laughter.

“She’s beautiful,” I breathed.

“She’s happy,” Pops corrected me. “I’m not
saying she wasn’t pretty. To me, she was the most beautiful thing
I’d ever seen in my life, but her happiness had a lot to do with
it. Happiness does that. It takes something simple and makes it
extraordinary. The garden helped.”

“The garden?”

He took the picture away
from me, perusing it. “Charlotte loved gardens. All gardens. I used
to joke that she was obsessed with them. She used to read that
book
The Secret Garden
to our children over and over again. Everyone should have
something special, she’d say. Everyone should have a
garden.”

“Some people don’t like to plant,” I pointed
out.

“Yes,” he agreed, looking up at me, “but do
you think she only meant gardens?”

No, I didn’t.

What are you trying to do, Mr. Lockston?

“Why did you show me this?” I asked
aloud.

Carefully, he placed the photograph back
where he’d gotten it from. “You remind me of her. The way you
looked when you were gardening just now. The way you connect with
it.”

“I just like flowers,” I argued.

He shook his head. “I think you may be more
hardheaded than my grandson, Tansy.”

Footsteps sounded inside the house, and we
glanced up just as Ivy Lockston swept into the room, a sundress
covered in sunflowers swaying around her ankles. “Dad—” She looked
up, caught sight of me, and frowned. “I’m sorry. I didn’t realize
we had company. I was going to see if you minded much if I borrowed
your car to go into town.”

“You remember Tansy Griffin, don’t you?” Pops
asked.

Ivy grinned, the expression tight. “Eli’s
girlfriend.”

“Friend,” I said, offering her my hand.
Noticing the dirt, I dropped it again. “Sorry, I forgot. I’ve been
doing some work outside.”

She waved off my words. “It’s fine, dear.”
Her gaze swept over my head to Pops’ face. “The car, Daddy?”

He sighed. “To town and back.”

She clapped. “Oh, good! I found the cutest
little coffee shop there the other day when Mandy and Lincoln were
up from the coast, and I could use the caffeine.” She glanced at
me. “Would you care to join me?”

I couldn’t help it. Every time I looked at
the woman all I saw was a mother who’d forced medicine down her
children’s throats. Maybe that was the problem with getting to know
someone before you got to know their families—you saw them through
their eyes, not your own.

“Thank you, but I better finish getting the
mulch in the azalea beds. I’ll make a run to the garden center in
town after that.”

“Can I bring you something back then?” she
asked.

I shook my head.

Shrugging, she took the keys her father
offered her and left, heeled sandals clicking on the wooden floors
in the foyer.

“He’s told you then,” Pops said suddenly.
“About his mother?”

My gaze swung to his face. “Yeah.”

Pops sighed, walked past me out of the room,
and then paused so that I could precede him outside the house.

“She isn’t the monster you’re envisioning.”
On the porch, Pops resumed his seat, rocking once more. “Eli’s
mother suffers from many things. Bipolar disorder. Depression, but
she also has something called Narcissistic Personality Disorder.
It’s rare to get that diagnosis, especially in women, and there’s
no medication to help it. There’s only medication to help her
manage the bipolar issues, the depression, and anxiety, which she
doesn’t like to take.”

“Narcissistic Personality Disorder?” I
asked.

“It makes her act out in distressing ways.
She comes off as conceited and superior. Often angry. She seems to
have less regard for her family than they do for her. The only way
to curb the disorder is to admit you have a problem and work on
ways to manage it.”

“Is that what made her do it? Is that what
made her drug her children?”

Pops winced. “He didn’t sugar coat it any,
did he?” He rocked, the chair creaking, before he said, “No, that’s
not what made her do it. I think she really thought she was helping
her children … and herself. There’s no going back now and changing
it. Ivy should have never had children, but she did, and I am
grateful every day for my grandchildren.”

Climbing back down the stairs, I returned to
the flower beds, to the remaining mulch, the list I’d laid on the
porch rail in my hand once more. “Do you want Eli to forgive her?
Is that why she’s here?”

Pops watched me. “No, I don’t want his
forgiveness. I want him to let go of it, and I think maybe … just
maybe, he’s starting to. My grandson has a strong head on his
shoulders. He’s been angry, and rightly so. He’s got more than just
his mother in his past. Out of all of my grandchildren, he’s lacked
the most in the parental department. His father is in and out of
prison and isn’t allowed contact with him at all.”

“But he had you,” I pointed out. “That’s
something.”

“Yes, he had me, and his grandmother when she
was alive. It doesn’t erase what his parents did, but I hope it
helps. Eli is going to be great one day. He may not be rich or
powerful, but he will be great. I’ve seen the way he is with his
brother and with other people,” he nodded at me, “and he knows how
to get to them. When he wants.”

Taking in a deep breath, I leveled a look at
him. “That’s a far cry from the guy I met on a hospital roof, Mr.
Lockston.”

“Pops,” he reminded me, winking, “and aren’t
we all a far cry from what we seem at first glance? If he wasn’t
good at getting under people’s skin, would you be here now?”

My gaze fell to my hands, to the mark on my
palm. I had another one on my thigh, hidden from sight. “We’re
never what we seem, and no, I guess I wouldn’t.”

Pops stood and swiped his brow. “It’s getting
a little hot out for me, but you take your time. Take a walk in the
orchard if you like. Pass me the list you’ve made, and I’ll call
the garden center and place an order for pick up. I think I’m going
to like watching this place come alive again. As for your pay, I’ll
make sure you get that at the end of the week.”

I walked the list up to him, and then climbed
back down. “My pay? You don’t have to pay me.”

He chuckled. “No worries, dear. You’ll get
what you earn, and I’ve no doubt I’ll be quite pleased with
it.”

He left, the screen door swinging shut behind
him.

A car pulled down the drive, a red Porsche
coming into view, and my stomach lurched only to fill with
disappointment when Jonathan climbed out of it. Alone.

“Did I pass my mother coming in?” he asked,
waving at me.

“She went to some,” I made air quotes, “cute
little coffee shop in town.”

He shook his head. “For gossip, I’m sure.”
Coming around his car, he perused the flower beds. Unlike Eli, who
always seemed to dress in a hurry, all wrinkled and thrown
together, Jonathan appeared fresh and organized. Swept back red
hair, tucked in short-sleeve polo, a pair of ironed jeans, and
tennis shoes that looked like they’d just come out of the box.

“This looks great,” Jonathan told me. “I
think anyway.”

I smiled. “You don’t know much about
gardening, do you?”

“Not a damn bit.”

My laugh filled the yard, and it felt good.
“Want to ride into town with me? I need to pick up an order your
grandfather is placing at the garden center. By the time we get
there, it should be ready.”

Jonathan stared at me. “You want me to go
with you? To a gardening center?”

“You have other plans?”

“In this town?” he asked,
mock horror on his face. “I did meet a few guys the other day I’ve
been hanging with while waiting on Eli, but otherwise, this place
is dead. I mean, you’re obviously having to
garden
because of the lack of
entertainment.”