Chapter Six
She woke disoriented, and for a moment thought she dreamed. The pretty room with all the soothing blues, the way the light slid through the windows, all seemed so strange and unfamiliar.
Then she remembered and had to fight the deep desire to just close her eyes, just escape into sleep again.
Not the way, she told herself. Hiding in sleep solved nothing. When she woke, Nina would still be dead, the life she’d built still in ruins.
She needed to move forward—somehow, somewhere. The only choice was to move forward. Move.
She got up, dressed. Out of ingrained habit she made the bed, fluffed the pillows before wandering downstairs.
Olivia sat at the kitchen island, wearing a black sweatshirt. Its white lettering said simply:
i dissent
She sipped from an oversize mug of coffee while she worked a crossword on her tablet.
Morgan pointed at the lettering. “To what?”
“Whatcha got? Let me fix you some coffee. We went for that fancy machine when we redid things around here.”
“I can get it. I’m a bartender—was,” Morgan corrected. “Coffee machines can’t defeat me. I’m sorry I slept so late.”
“After the drive you had, I expected you to sleep longer. How about some breakfast?”
“No, nothing now, thanks. Please don’t fuss over me.”
“Grandmothers are designed to fuss over their grandchildren. It makes us happy. Don’t you want me to be happy?”
“Coffee machines don’t defeat me,” Morgan muttered as beans ground, as coffee streamed into the mug she’d set below, “but grandmothers do.”
“Because we’re so wise, and wisdom hones sneaky. And I see you still take some coffee in your cream and sugar.”
“I thought you’d be in town, at the shop by now.”
“Your mother’s taking the morning shift. She only just left.”
Sipping, nodding, Morgan leaned back against the counter. “Meaning you’re taking shifts keeping an eye on me.”
“Looks that way,” Olivia said easily. “And I asked for this morning because I think it may be easier for you to tell your grandmother what’s in your heart and mind right now than your mother. If I’m wrong—though when am I wrong?—I can switch with Audrey.”
“What’s in my heart and mind.” Morgan closed her eyes. “I lost everything, most vitally my closest friend.” She opened her eyes again. “Nina’s mother told me you wrote her, so did Mom. It meant a lot to her.”
“We only knew Nina through you, but that made her part of the family to us.”
“After Nina … Well, I lost everything else. My savings—gone—my home—someone else’s now. My car, and I know that’s nothing really, but I loved that damn car. My plans, my goals, my pride, my sense of security and self. Poof.” She flicked her fingers in the air. “A year ago, just one year ago, I had everything under control, everything lined up. Now? I’ve got nothing, literally nothing, and I’m living in my grandmother’s house.”
“All right.” Olivia lifted her mug, sipped. “You’re entitled to feel all of that. In fact, in your place, I’d have myself a first-class rage party.”
Not pity party, Morgan noted. No self-pity for Olivia Nash. “I’ve had a few.”
“Good, that’s healthy. You deserve them. You’re entitled to feel all that,” Olivia repeated, “even when you’re wrong.”
“Where am I wrong?”
“You say you have nothing? You have Morgan Nash Albright, damn it, and don’t ever forget it. And this is not your grandmother’s house, this is the Kennedy-Nash family home. I’m giving your grandfather first billing on it.
“Now, you can take as much time as you need to wallow, to sleep late, to rage, to curse whichever deity works best for you. You were victimized, and for a strong, smart woman—and you’re both—that’s devastating as much as it’s a pure pisser. When you’re finished, you’ll figure out what to do next.”
“It is a pisser. It is a pure pisser. Why hasn’t anyone said just that before now?”
“Because no one else is your gram. Haven’t you said it yourself?”
“I felt guilty when I even thought it.” But she didn’t now, she realized, because Gram had said it first. “Everyone felt sorry for me, but—”
“Nobody got pissed for you—or showed it. Trust me, I’m plenty pissed for you. So’s your mother, in her more delicate way. I’d like to kick that bastard’s balls blue before I twist his dick off at the root.”
With a shrug, Olivia drank more coffee. “But that’s just not-so-delicate me.”
“I can’t say exactly why,” Morgan said after a moment, “but that really helps.”
“Good.”
“I have to get a job.”
“There’s no ‘have to’ right now. Sit down, I’m making you an omelet.”
“Gram—”
“Nobody turns down one of my omelets.” Olivia rose. “Now sit. I’m going to ask you for a favor.”
“What?”
“Take two weeks. Sleep, eat, read, watch movies, take walks, build a snowman, whatever.” She got out eggs, cheese, fresh spinach. “The stress of this past year shows, baby of my baby. It shows.”
Hard to argue that, Morgan thought as she sat. She saw it every time she looked in the mirror.
“You take some time. If you need something practical to do, fine. Come into the shop and we’ll put you to work a few hours a week. Otherwise, it’s time to catch up with yourself.”
“I need to earn a living.”
“You do, of course, and you will. Two weeks out of your life won’t change that. And your mother and I want some time with you. I think—and again, when am I wrong?—you need time with us.”
Morgan said nothing as Olivia whisked eggs in a bowl while a skillet heated on the stove.
“I feel like such a failure, Gram.”
“You’ll get over that, because you’re not and never have been. You had your world fall away from under you. I know what that’s like. I had mine fall away.”
“When Pa died.”
“Then, but we had a lifetime together, and all those memories. I can pick one out, like chocolates from a box, and every one has its own flavor. But a long time ago. I lost a child.”
“What?” Morgan shot up straight. “When? I never heard—”
“Your mother was barely two, so she doesn’t remember. I never talked to her about it until after Steve died.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“Steve and I built this house, this big, wonderful house, and planned to fill it with children. We wanted at least four, and when Audrey came along, we were so happy. Our beautiful girl, our first child. It was all so easy, really. And then, right on schedule, we had another coming.”
She poured eggs in the skillet, added the cheese, the spinach. “I was eight months along. We were finishing the nursery, arguing over names, all the things you do. And something went wrong. Everything went wrong. I lost the baby and any chance to have another. A little boy. He never had a chance to take his first breath.”
“Oh, Gram.”
“With the grief—I know what Nina’s mother feels because I felt it—but with the grief, I felt a failure. I lost my child and there would never be another.”
She flipped the omelet with the panache of a French chef.
“We got through it, but it was hard. It was brutal. We had our beautiful daughter. Steve had his work. I started throwing pots.” She laughed at that. “I was absolutely terrible at it, and never got better. I’m a businesswoman and no artist, but trying to be gave me a deep respect and admiration for artists, craftspeople. So it gave me a new direction.”
“The lopsided green cup he kept pencils in on the desk in his study,” Morgan remembered. “He told me once you made that in the long ago.”
“It was supposed to be a vase.” Olivia shook her head. “That man loved me. ‘Sell the stuff, Livvy,’ he said to me. ‘You know what’s good and you know how to sell. You just need a place to sell it.’”
“Crafty Arts was his idea?”
“Another chocolate from the box. So I gave up making bad pottery, and we started the shop, just a tiny place at first. But it grew, and so did Audrey. And I had a world again. A different one than I’d always planned, but a good world.”
She set the plated omelet in front of Morgan. “You’ll make new plans, build a new world. Now eat.”
“Thanks. Thanks for telling me. Gram? Could I have that cup? The lopsided green cup? It’ll remind me of him, and you, and finding new directions.”
Olivia came around the island, pressed a kiss to Morgan’s temple. Held on an extra minute.
“Of course you can. Now, you keep this in your busy mind. The man who did all this? He’ll pay, one way or the other, whether or not you ever know about it, he’ll pay. Karma’s not just a bitch, she’s a righteous bitch. And he won’t break you, because you won’t let him.
“Two weeks,” she added.
“Two weeks,” Morgan agreed. “I love you, Gram.”
“Of course you do. I love you right back. Now eat.”
So she ate, and she slept. She took walks and sat by the fire with a book. By the third day, she wondered how much longer she could keep it up without losing her mind.
Her grandmother might request two weeks, but Morgan’s wiring demanded busy. On day three, with both Olivia and Audrey at work, she sat down at the secondhand laptop, opened the spreadsheet she’d created months before.
Reality hadn’t changed since the last time she’d gone over it. Broke still equaled broke. But this time she worked on projections. No question she could live in the pretty blue room as long as she wanted or needed, rent free. But wiring also required she pull her weight.
She could take over some household tasks, but her ladies already had a weekly cleaning crew, and the trio of women who tended the rambling old Tudor had done so for a dozen years.
If she took over cleaning, she put people out of a job.
Unacceptable.
Laundry—the cleaning trio already dealt with most of that.
She could do the marketing—something—but she couldn’t subject the ladies to her cooking unless she got a lot better at it.
Marketing, doing the dishes after meals? That should keep her busy for about three hours a week, which didn’t begin to fill the hole.
She needed work. A job. Needed to earn an income.
To start on that? Drive into town, look around, visit the shop. And no, she wouldn’t work there. It steered much too close to living rent free.
She put on makeup, and since she hadn’t indulged in a professional cut and style in months, tried a few snips here and there.
She definitely wouldn’t get a job at a salon, but it wasn’t terrible.
She dressed in something other than sweats. Winter-weight leggings, boots, a red sweater over a thermal shirt. Before she could change her mind and just retreat to her room, again, she dragged on her coat, wool cap, scarf, and stepped out into the frigid, unrelenting grip of winter.
And prayed Nina’s car started.
It coughed a little, wheezed a little more, but turned over.
In under ten minutes she broke through the snow-coated trees, crossed the narrow bridge over the frozen whip of river, and turned onto High Street.
Westridge ranked, she supposed, somewhere between big town and small city. Picturesque, certainly, especially in its winter coat. It drew tourists, she knew, in every season. Winter sports, summer sports, fall foliage, spring hikes. Hunting, fishing, birding.
The Resort at Westridge, with its classy cabins and classier hotel suites, drew the well-heeled into the area, offering all those activities along with exceptional food, an admirable wine cellar, two bars—a very casual lodge bar, and the more upscale glass-walled bar with a four-sided stone fireplace that catered to après ski, or après whatever the guests wished.
The town offered a banquet of restaurants, from diner style to five-star fancy, shops, boutiques, sporting goods, Vermont-flavored souvenirs, art galleries, and more.
Many of those nestled together on High Street, including her grandmother’s Crafty Arts. Or, as the sign read now, Morgan noted, Crafty Arts and Wine Café.
Even this late in the winter season and before the spring thaw, it … well, it nearly bustled, she admitted. Since she really wasn’t familiar with the geography, she had to hunt for parking. She remembered a small lot behind Crafty Arts but didn’t know how to navigate around the hilly roads and busy intersections to find it.
Still, street parking—when she found it—offered her a chance to check out the main commercial areas and possible opportunities.
Restaurants, retail, cafés, a bakery, an upscale bar. She could wait tables if she had to, but the bar hit top of her list. On side streets, she spotted a gallery, low-rise apartments, more shops, a doctor’s office, a wineshop—with a small wine bar. Next on her list.
On a less blustery day, she promised herself, she’d explore farther. But for now, she stopped in front of Crafty Arts and Wine Café.
Someone, she thought, had done a crafty and arty job on the display window. Tables and stands of varying heights held blown glass art arranged with wooden bowls, pottery. A soft gray throw draped over the back of a rocking chair.
Inside she found warmth, not just in the air, but the light, in the gleam of the wood floors. Paintings covered the walls. Old cabinets displayed handcrafted jewelry and small pieces of pottery, silverwork, copper. Another highlighted candles. Open shelves sparkled with blown glass.
A long antique bookcase transformed into the checkout counter where a woman chattered away with a customer while she wrapped up purchases. Behind her, a glorious stained glass peacock spread its tail.
The counterwoman glanced up, smiled. “Can I help you find anything?”
“Not yet, thanks. Just taking it in.”
She wandered on. They’d done so much, she realized, since she’d last been in. Wood or ironwork tables held more pottery, lamps, cutting boards, platters.
She walked upstairs. If memory served, the second floor had once been used as storage and her grandmother’s office. No more. Here she found textiles. Handcrafted scarves, gloves, hats, tablecloths, and runners.
Handmade soaps and lotions, more furniture, more art.
It occurred to her if she’d walked into this shop and still had disposable income, she’d never have walked out empty-handed.
When she walked down, she passed a couple heading up, and found the counter clerk just finishing up with another customer.
“Doing okay?”
“Yes. Sorry, I should’ve said, but you were busy. I’m Olivia’s granddaughter.”
“You’re Morgan! Oh my goodness.” Reaching out, she grabbed both of Morgan’s hands. “I went to high school with your mother! It’s so nice to meet you. I’m Sue Newton.”
“It’s nice to meet you, too.”
“They’re in the café—opening this Saturday. Some finishing touches going in. You go right on over. It’s going to be great.”
A sheet of plastic hung over the wide case opening. She pushed through into the light and bright. They’d hung plastic over the wide front window, something she found clever.
Keep people guessing until the big reveal.
She judged it would be big.
They’d carried the same wood flooring through for flow from space to space. The cream walls held more art—never miss a chance for a sale. They’d gone dark and moody on the millwork for contrast, and it worked.
The bar matched the millwork with a countertop of granite that married the cream with streaks of the dark. They’d scattered low tops, high tops, four tops, a few booths in deep blue leather.
And—not to miss a trick—had a small retail section of wine toppers, glasses, corkscrews, mugs, teacups, coffee and tea accessories.
They’d coffered the ceiling, adding the classy and the cozy.
Because she couldn’t help herself, she walked behind the bar.
Shelves, a fridge, an ice maker, a wine cooler, a speed rack, a section for tools, another for bar mops. She pulled out a leather-bound menu and found her eyebrows rising up at the extent of the selection.
Before she could put it back and step out, her ladies came out from the back.
“It’s going to work,” Audrey was saying, then spotted Morgan. “What a surprise! What do you think?” She spread her arms.
“I think I’m stunned. It’s amazing, everything. You changed the upstairs next door, and it’s wonderful. And this? It’s beautiful. Fancy but not fussy. Efficient but not staid.”
“Still needs a few touches, but we’ll be ready for Saturday.” Olivia gestured. “Come look at the kitchen. We’re offering baked goods, and that meant a damn commercial kitchen. But it’ll be worth it.”
She walked through the swinging door.
It shined, as the back of the house should. Stainless steel gleamed; steel shelves held cookware and tools. The big commercial hood over a six-burner stove top, the walk-in refrigerator said professional and impressive. Dishwasher, sink, mop sink, and the biggest, shiniest mixer she’d ever seen added more of the same.
“You’ve got it all. A really good use of the space.”
“And it passed final inspection.” Audrey swiped a hand over her forehead. Then bounced a little on her toes so her shiny tail of blond swung.
“We needed it compact because we needed room for…”
She opened a door.
“Holy crap!”
They’d created a wine cellar, filling three walls with racks, filling racks with bottles.
“You’ve got your whites,” Audrey began, “domestic, French, Italian, and so on, then the reds, then rosés, then sparklings over here. The sommelier at the resort helped us.”
“Because he’s sweet on your mother.”
“Mom.”
“I speak truth.”
The faint flush that rose into her mother’s cheeks left Morgan stunned speechless.
“Maybe a little. Anyway, office and more storage upstairs. We’re using the old office space above the shop for more stock.”
“I saw. I went up. It’s wonderful.”
“It really is. We have a door—locked from the office side—so we can walk over and down if we need to. It’s all so much, so I’m in a constant state of terror and excitement.”
“I’m going to say, without bias or hesitation, it’s brilliant.”
“I’m so glad you’re here.” Audrey gave her a one-armed squeeze. “You can be part of it. You’ll come on Saturday, won’t you?”
“Absolutely. I’ll help work the bar if you need it.”
“Really?”
Audrey beamed; Olivia just smiled.
“Not for a job, for family. You’ve hired bartenders by now.”
“We have two,” Olivia told her. “We think one has managerial potential. But I know we’d welcome your opinion there. And it would take a lot off our minds if you’d more or less supervise on Saturday.”
“Done. I’m going to start looking for work next week, but I’ll pitch in here. If there’s something I can do to help you get going, I’ll do it.”
“How about now, with those finishing touches?” Olivia gestured them out. “We need to dress the restroom.”
“Unisex, ADA compliant,” Audrey added.
“We need to choose the art. A table or console, something to go on it. We need to dress the tables in the café, and this and that.”
“My schedule happens to be open at this time.”
“Excellent. When we’re done, I’m taking both my girls out to dinner.”
She enjoyed it. For a few hours, she didn’t think of what she’d lost and what she had to do next. She enjoyed spending time with both women, debating appropriate art and furnishings, placing them, changing them.
And maybe putting just a little bit of her own stamp on a family business with her idea of adding fairy lights around the big window for a little sparkle.
She enjoyed dinner out, which, instead of the fancy she’d assumed her grandmother would choose, turned out to be pizza and a carafe of red house wine.
By the time she went to bed, she felt she’d actually accomplished something. Maybe, hopefully, she’d pulled out of wallowing time.
For the next few days she split her time between polishing up her résumé and helping prep for the grand opening. She unpacked, washed, and stored the cups, saucers, creamers, and sugar bowls her grandmother had designed for a local potter to create.
White with a red clover—the Vermont state flower.
“They’re perfect, Gram.”
“They are.”
“You need to price these for sale.”
“I thought about it.”
“I hope you do. I had this other thought.”
“How much is it going to cost me?”
“I think it’ll do the opposite, in the long run. It’s a wine bar, yes, and you’re tapping local vineyards for some of that. How about you tap local for your coffee beans, your tea? Then you can sell it—pretty tins of tea, classy bags of coffee. There are a couple of roasters local enough, and you could work with a tea farm. Vermont has a few.”
“That’s a thought.” And eyes narrowed on it, Olivia considered. “That’s a damn good thought.”
“Crafty Arts is all about Vermont arts and crafts. It plays on that. I did a little research.”
She reached in her bag, pulled out a folder.
“A little?”
“Well, once I got started. So it’s something to think about, going down the road.”
“And I will.” Olivia put on the bold red cheaters hanging from the chain around her neck, skimmed the first pages in the file. “It’s a good idea, Morgan. You’ve been an enormous help the last few days. Good brain, good eye, and a strong back. Much appreciated.”
She lowered the file. “I can’t talk you into managing the new space?”
“You don’t need me, Gram. If you did, I’d at least get you started. But you and Mom? You’ve got this. I need to get my own.”
“I expected that. So I’m going to tell you I heard Après—that’s the main bar at the resort—is looking for a bartender/manager. Or will be next week. Their head bartender just gave his notice. His wife got a job offer in South Carolina, and they’re relocating.”
Olivia set the file down. “Because I love you, I sucked it up, and I spoke with Lydia.”
“Lydia?”
“Lydia Jameson. She and I go back, farther than either of us care to remember, and her husband was good friends with your pa. She keeps her hand in—hell, both hands in. You can send in your résumé, and they’ll take a look before they start the job-open process.”
“At the resort. I’ve never been in Après, but I checked out their website, and it was on my list. Thank you.” She pulled Olivia into a hug.
“It doesn’t mean you’ve got the position.”
“I know. That’s up to me. But it’s a chance, and a chance to do what I’m good at.”
“You send your résumé to Lydia. I’ve got her email. Like I said, we go back. Write yourself a solid cover letter.”
“I will. Thank you, Gram. I’ll still pitch in here as much as I can, whether or not I get this job.”
“We’re counting on it.”
That evening, she googled Lydia Jameson to get a sense, and saw why Lydia and Olivia went way back. Both born and raised in Vermont, both from New England stock. Educated, cultured women, rock-ribbed and steel-spined.
Businesswomen, both. Lydia’s business dwarfed her grandmother’s, but business was business.
She spent a solid hour drafting, revising, and refining a cover letter. Formal and respectful, she decided, with a personal touch in her thanks for the consideration.
After a deep breath, one hand on that lopsided green cup, she hit send.
A new chance. And she had others, she reminded herself. Maybe she hadn’t landed where she’d expected, but she had opportunities here.
An opportunity to transplant those roots she wanted so much.
Restless, she went downstairs. Hair loose around her shoulders, Audrey stood in the kitchen pouring a glass of wine.
There came that light flush again.
“Caught me.”
“How about I join you?”
“I’m so nervous. I thought a glass of wine might help me sleep. I can’t believe we’re opening the café tomorrow. It was an idea, then it was the planning, then the work and more planning. And now?”
She handed Morgan a second glass. “It’s here, and I’m nothing but nerves. Your gram’s up there sleeping like a baby. She has no nerves, I swear.”
“Because she knows you’ve got a hit on your hands.”
“You really think that?”
“No. I know that. Listen, retail, art—like the shop—that’s not in my wheelhouse. But a wine bar is. I slipped into the wineshop a few blocks down, and its wine bar’s lovely. Small, dark, and moody, well run, heavy wood, deep colors. Yours? Airy, arty, a different vibe. And the way you’ve opened it—or will tomorrow—to the very well-established shop? It’s just damn smart. Like adding the coffee services, the tea options is smart. The baked on-site pastries and scones? It’s all there, Mom.”
“I keep telling myself that, but it sounds better when you say it.”
She’d always considered her mother on the flighty side. A woman who couldn’t settle down, couldn’t make a decision and see it through. But she didn’t see that now.
“I’m sorry I didn’t keep in touch more, visit more.”
“You had a life to build. And you did keep in touch. Sweetie, I have friends who only hear from their grown kids when they make the effort, only see them when they travel. You called every couple of weeks, you emailed, you visited every Christmas. Don’t be sorry. I’m so proud of you.”
“That makes one of us.”
“You stop that. If I’d been in your place, I’d still be hiding under the covers. You’re a doer, Morgan. You always have been.”
“So were you,” Morgan realized.
“Me?” Audrey laughed, sipped wine. “I was more of a going-alonger.”
“I don’t think—” She broke off as the phone in her pocket signaled. “That’s my email tone. Who could that be? It’s after eleven.”
“Find out.”
Morgan pulled out the phone, swiped, stared. “Oh God. I have an interview Sunday at eleven at Après.”
“Oh! That’s great! That’s wonderful! Now we can both be nervous wrecks. Oh! Let’s top off this wine, take it up, and pick out what you’re going to wear. That’s what I’m good at.”
“I—sure. Yeah. I never expected to hear anything so fast.”
“Lydia Jameson? In the race between the turtle and the hare, she’s the hare. And she always wins. Let’s play shop your closet.”