Chapter Eight
The depth of stupidity, laced with gullibility, in the human race never failed to amaze him.
And delight him.
After all, without those lovely weaknesses, how would he live his life in the style he deserved?
Gavin Rozwell had learned early on the female of the species offered almost endless opportunities to exploit and manipulate. The method, of course, depended on the mark. For some, it only required good looks.
He had those, and had been assured of it all his life.
Others? Add charm—and he could sprinkle it on, pile it on, shovel it out as the mark and situation called for.
He had that talent.
Then again, some liked the rough stuff and no problem. But he kept the rough on the easy side. Until the end.
There were those who fell for the lone wolf, the brooder, the poet, the laid back, or the tightly wound.
He had a million personas he could wear like a bespoke suit.
Sob stories provided openings for certain types. Try the recent widower, or the cuckolded husband.
The trick? Be who the target wanted you to be.
And he excelled at it.
Again, he’d learned from an early age, watching his own mother fall for line after line. She’d truly believed people held inside them a core of good—no matter how deeply buried.
Nobody, according to good old Mom, was purely bad, not through and through. And in her world evil hadn’t existed.
God made the world, after all, and God was good.
She’d believed—no matter how often she’d been knocked flat—kindness triumphed.
His mother, the saint.
His mother, the idiot.
She’d considered him a gift—her handsome, clever little boy. Sure, his father had knocked her around on the rare occasions he’d paid any attention at all. Then came the excuses, from her—never him. He had a hard day, he gets upset, I shouldn’t have said anything.
And when he’d dumped them, taking even the money she’d tucked away under her cheap, serviceable white bras and panties, she’d made excuses.
He loves us too much to stay.
So he—her gift—saw weakness, a woman’s weakness, ripe for mining.
For her, he became the loving, devoted son while she worked menial jobs for assholes who barely paid her enough to make rent. A simple clutch of dandelions or a heart cut out of construction paper ensured she waited on him, hand and foot.
And either didn’t notice, or never mentioned, the five or ten bucks he’d take out of the coffee can she kept tucked in the kitchen cabinet.
He did well in school. He had a good brain, comported himself with absolute politeness. And used the trust he’d carefully built to run short cons on students and teachers alike.
He had a knack for computers and, honing it, destroyed his eighth-grade history teacher’s life.
Bastard gave him a B-minus!
The hacking proved remarkably simple once he got going. Loading up Mr. Stockman’s home computer with child porn had presented a challenge he’d accepted.
Stockman lost his job, his wife, and his children and did six years in a federal pen.
There’s your B-minus, asshole.
His speech as valedictorian at his high school graduation brought his mother—and others—to tears. He accepted a scholarship to Michigan State. Though he’d had several colleges to choose from, he’d claimed he needed to stay close to home, near his mother in Detroit, so he could drive back regularly to help her.
He did so, faithfully, waiting until the spring of his second semester to make her his first kill.
A shock! A tragedy! The senseless murder of a forty-one-year-old woman during a break-in of her rattrap of a rental house while her only son, her loving and devoted son, slept ninety miles away at college.
Her nineteen-year-old son, who’d broken to pieces at her funeral. And at nineteen, of age, clear of any risk of foster homes or legal guardians, he’d tasted freedom.
He cashed in her life insurance policy, one he’d convinced her to take out—only fifteen dollars a month for peace of mind—and Gavin Rozwell, a natural-born psychopath, hit the road.
He thrived.
For a while he just traveled, lived high. But the insurance money couldn’t last forever.
He ran simple cons for a while, and that proved fun and profitable. Then he moved to identity theft, and that brought more profit and satisfaction.
But it lacked a genuine thrill. No big kick. No wild buzz.
So while he traveled, he planned, he plotted, and found his true calling.
He knew he killed his mother over and over with the termination of each mark. He’d aced his psyche courses, after all. But so what? He enjoyed it, each time, every time. Ending them, looking into their shocked eyes when he choked the life from them, brought back the moment of looking into his mother’s.
Who said you can’t go home again?
And it served as the culmination of the thrill, the pleasure of taking everything they valued first, just the way his father had taken everything his mother had valued.
Well, except for him, of course.
Now, on a lovely spring morning, going by Oliver Salk, he sat on the terrace of his hotel suite in Maui, taking in the air, the view while he sipped his second cup of coffee.
In the twelve years since he’d murdered his mother, he’d lived well, lived high. The quarter-million term policy had given him the means and the opportunity to pursue the lifestyle he’d been born for.
He lifted his cup, toasted. “Thanks, Mom.”
He’d earned it, just as he’d earned every penny since, because it was work, and work that required time, skill, brains. The weeks, often months of research and planning took a toll. Then add in the expense of maintaining his looks while changing them just a bit along the way, the cost of acquiring new identities and the wardrobe to suit them.
Some of the marks expected sex, something he’d honestly never enjoyed. But he considered it the cost of doing business.
There’d been that one in Portland three—no, four years ago, he remembered. God, she’d been relentless sexually. Then again, he’d cleared nearly eight hundred thousand before he ended their relationship. And her.
He’d done very well for himself, enjoyed his life, his work, his travels. And his success rate had been perfect, because he’d earned perfect. He deserved perfect.
Until Morgan Albright.
The one that got away.
It grated still, and he could admit the miss had left him shaken. More than a little shaken. Enough to take a break, indulge in a long vacation.
The bitch would’ve talked to the cops, to those asshole feds, and maybe, just maybe, he’d let something slip with her he shouldn’t have.
Not likely, but the nagging maybe pushed him to take a breather, to put a few thousand miles between them.
He could afford it, after all, some time in San Diego, then a couple of months in Malibu, before some island hopping in Hawaii.
Nothing better than a fine hotel on a beach, to his mind.
And as the saying went, all work and no play made Gavin a dull boy.
But even in fine hotels on fine beaches, he thought of her, and thought of her. He’d taken what was hers, but she’d lived. She’d broken his streak and that ate away at him.
He had to fix that, fix her, reclaim his luck. To add to it, he was bored. Work was play for him, and he missed it, and missing it, had gone into research mode.
He’d need to reclaim that luck, start a new streak before dealing with Morgan.
He had two likely candidates on the mainland, and he’d choose the lucky winner soon. But Morgan? She proved people were stupid, gullible, and always ripe for the picking.
She’d changed her passwords—as if that mattered—and had shut down her already sparce social media accounts over the last year.
But her mother had them all. She posted regularly for the family business in Vermont. Pretty photos, cheerful marketing, with a personal touch.
So he knew Morgan, flat broke, had moved to Vermont, back with Mommy and Grandma. And all those happy posts helped him keep an eye on her. He’d researched her family, the family home and business before he’d walked into that two-bit bar, so he knew the setup, the finances.
When he was ready, he’d use her mother’s accounts to find a back door and hack right back into Morgan’s.
When he was ready.
Maybe he’d been meant to miss her the first time around. The idea of “meant to” soothed him. She’d hurt him by living, he could hurt her so much more by letting her live awhile, then taking everything again.
A second shot required a change of tactics, a different method altogether. But with the potential of more, much more. More money, more pain, more pleasure for him.
What if, just what if, he killed all three?
Something to think about.
But first, he had to get back in the game. Time to choose that lucky winner, he decided, and started making a plan.
Morgan loved going back to work, the routine, the structure, the schedule. Putting on her uniform made her feel productive, capable. Meeting the staff meant she was, again, part of a team.
Training proved straightforward enough. Après was certainly a bigger and more upscale operation than any she’d worked in before, but she’d handle it.
Maybe her visit to the wine cellar left her a little breathless—those racks upon racks, and the vintages far beyond any she’d decanted in the past—but she’d handle that, too.
The menu from the back of the house ranked several classy steps above the Round, and guests received maple-roasted almonds and picholine olives with their drinks instead of pretzels and bar nuts, but that was all a matter of style.
She breezed through her training week, serving guests not unlike those she’d painted for Nell during her interview. Though she considered Nick the best of those who tended bar, she had no complaints.
As for the waitstaff, their training showed.
At the end of the week, she received a summons from Lydia Jameson.
She’d expected an elaborate office, something regal to suit the photo of the woman she’d studied and the biography she’d googled to go with it.
Instead she found a modest, workmanlike room, a serviceable desk with a chair as straight-backed as Lydia’s spine.
She wore her dark honey hair in soft waves around a strong face of sharp points. Cheekbones, chin cut like diamonds. The decades of lines didn’t detract from it but made her look wise. And formidable.
Her eyes were deep golden brown behind the lenses of black-framed glasses. Her poppy-red lips didn’t smile as she studied Morgan.
“Have a seat.” The voice matched the face—strong—as she gestured with a hand adorned with a wedding set with a blinding square-cut diamond solitaire. “And welcome to the Jameson family.”
“Thank you. I’m very grateful to be a part of it.”
“I see Olivia in you, and some of Audrey with it. I imagine you got the eyes from your father.”
“The color, yes.”
“I have a great deal of respect for Olivia, and in the last several years, for your mother. It’s why you’re here. Or I should say it’s why you were given the opportunity to be here.”
“I know that. I’m grateful for that.”
“As you should be. I had Nell interview you, as I felt I should step back. I also have a great deal of respect for my granddaughter.”
“As you should.”
Lydia’s eyebrows cocked up at that.
“Nell tells me, as did Don, you’ll be an asset to the resort.”
“I’m determined to be.”
“Are you a determined individual, Ms. Albright?”
“Yes, ma’am, I am.”
Lydia let that hang a moment while she continued to study Morgan in silence.
“It’s difficult for a determined individual to start over, but without determination there’s no chance of succeeding. Your previous employers also touted your loyalty. We prize loyalty here, and will give it in turn.”
“I appreciate that, and I’ve already seen it. Nick Tennant, ten years; Opal Reece, twelve; Adam Fine, sixteen. And others with that much or more. People don’t stay happily at a job if they’re not treated well, if there’s not respect and loyalty on both sides. I’m going to give you my best, Mrs. Jameson, and my best is solid.”
“I’d expect nothing less from Olivia’s granddaughter. Once again, welcome to the Jameson family.” This time Lydia rose, held out a hand.
“Thank you.”
As she walked to Après, Morgan let herself breathe again. She was pretty damn sure she’d passed the last test.
On her first official day as manager of Après, she wore her lucky earrings. And came in an hour before shift for a meeting with Nell and her mother—Drea Jameson, Events coordinator.
They met in Drea’s office, a larger space than Lydia’s that included a rosy-hued love seat and two floral-print chairs.
Morgan thought the feminine touches suited the woman, with her tumble of auburn waves, porcelain skin, and dreamy blue eyes.
She wore a plum-colored sheath with a waist-length jacket. Morgan imagined the slim-heeled gray pumps boosted the petite woman’s height.
“I’m so sorry I haven’t had a chance to come into Après and introduce myself.”
“Two weddings, an anniversary party, a corporate banquet, and the Grototti family reunion over the last couple of weeks wouldn’t leave you much time.”
Drea smiled, and Morgan wondered if the fact her lip shade exactly matched the love seat was deliberate or a happy accident.
She voted deliberate.
“Nell said you pay attention.”
“Events take tables in the bar.”
“They do. So.” She handed Morgan a folder. “Events scheduled for the next four weeks. Don liked both electronic and hard copies monthly. There will be changes. Additions, cancellations, and you’ll see final numbers in red.”
Morgan opened the folder, skimmed the printouts. “Busy. Busy’s good. I’m fine with just e-copies for myself, but I’d like to post the printout in the back of the house—and I can generate that. Updating as needed.”
She looked up. “Is it possible to have the events list four to six months out?”
“Of course. Don liked to keep things more compact.”
“It would give me a bigger scope and more long-range planning for vacation time, requested shift changes, which events require bar setups and bartenders. And with those, full bar or wine, beer, soft drinks.”
She turned to Nell. “I understand that falls under your supervision, but the private bars decrease the tables in Après, at least during the course of the event, but still require staff pulled from Après or the Lodge Bar.”
“True enough.” Nell cocked her head. “More?”
“Well, while corporate meetings are a relatively small part of the resort’s business, attendees use the bar for networking, casual meetings, so six months out there would ensure I had enough stock on hand. We had to borrow a bottle of 1800 Silver tequila from the Lodge Bar last Friday night.”
“Knox Seed and Soil,” Nell said. “Friday night tequila shots. We should’ve been prepared.”
“Don’s head was out the door.” Drea lifted her coffee cup. “And that’s understandable. I can give you six months out on all booked events, with a two-month view, delivered to your resort inbox.”
“That would be perfect, thanks.”
Nell angled her head. “And still more?”
Après might not be her bar, but.
“Since I’m asking, I might as well try my luck with one more. I’d like to feature a seasonal specialty drink, like the spa does with scrubs and lotions for services. Apple’s the state fruit, so we could try featuring a cider—hard and soft—cocktail for fall or winter, or maybe mulled for winter. A sparkling cider mix for spring, sangria for summer, that sort of thing. Or, if you approve, I could coordinate with the spa, play into whatever they’re featuring.”
“And if they’re featuring lavender scrub?” Nell wondered. “That’s coming up next week for the spring launch.” Nell set down her empty cup. “Which I’m betting you already know.”
As she did, Morgan was ready. “Lavender margarita, lavender gin fizz, lavender champagne cocktail. I’d need to know and order the simple syrup, and have the sprigs on hand for garnish. But there’s a lot you can do with it for spring or summer drinks.”
“I’d like a lavender margarita,” Drea decided. “It sounds lovely. What do you think, Nell?”
“Resort-wide, or exclusive to Après?”
“That would be up to you.”
“Yeah, it would. Let’s try the spa coordination. Resort-wide if it takes. You can try it in Après next week.”
“Great. I’ll order what we need.”
“I’ll walk out with you.” Nell rose.
“Welcome aboard, Morgan.” Drea rose as well. “And tell your mother and grandmother I miss them in yoga class.”
“Yoga class?”
“Studio Om, on South Alley off High Street. We try to make the nine o’clock class on Wednesday mornings, but with the new café project and my schedule, we’ve missed class for a month. More like six weeks, for me, I think. Tell them I’m determined to make it this week.”
“I will.”
“She meditates, too,” Nell said when they walked through the outer office with its ringing phones and busy assistants. “Do you meditate?”
“Only when I’m unconscious.”
With a laugh, Nell shook back her hair, left down to skim her shoulders today. A more casual look to go with the gray pants and navy sweater.
“Me, too. I don’t know whether to be fascinated or baffled by the idea of a lavender margarita.”
“Come in next week. I’ll make you one.”
“I just might.” She pulled her buzzing phone from her pocket. “Well, no meditation or margaritas for me. Good luck tonight,” she added, and fast-walked in the opposite direction.
“Busy’s best,” Morgan murmured.
She exchanged waves or nods with some of the staff she’d met as she walked toward the lobby, over the marble floors, and through the archway.
It was, she thought, starting to feel like she’d found her place.
The bar buzzed, as a bar should in her opinion, with people relaxing with a drink before dinner, or settling down for bar food. At a quick scan, she spotted a couple of corporate types, heads together, conversation intense. A trio of women laughing together over glasses of wine.
Then stopped short when she recognized the two men having a beer. More Jamesons, she realized. The patriarch, Michael “Mick” Jameson, the man who, along with his wife, Lydia Miles Jameson, had expanded what had been a handful of cabins and a twenty-room hotel to the Resort at Westridge.
He sat with Nell’s brother Liam, the youngest sibling.
They made a picture, Morgan thought, the generations. The grandfather with his sleek pewter hair topping a craggy face, the younger with a careless mop of brown and a face smooth and unlined.
And yet you wouldn’t mistake them for anything but family as they sat, first generation in a sweatshirt, younger in a hoodie, holding an animated conversation over their evening beer.
Business, pleasure, or both? she wondered as she made her way to the bar and behind it.
“You’re early.” Nick poured another round—Chardonnay, Zinfandel, and a Cab—she identified for the trio of women at table five. “Tabs running, all tables,” he told Morgan.
“Two just sat down on the lobby side as I came in.”
“Lacy’s on it. She’s in the back picking up a cheese plate for that side. Bosses at table eight.”
“Saw that.”
“Heady Toppers,” he said, identifying the beer. “If they go for another round, add the cheese fries even if they don’t order it. Mick loves the cheese fries.”
“Got it. Go home. I’ll log your tips.”
“You’re the boss now.”
“Looks that way.”
A man who looked like he’d just waked from a long nap slid onto a stool.
“Good evening. What can I get you?”
He gave her a dreamy smile. “I just had my first hot stone massage. You ever had one?”
“Not yet.”
“Do yourself a favor. Only time I’ve been more relaxed is never. My wife’s getting one, meeting me here. It’s our first time coming here.”
“And how are you enjoying it?”
“I’m thinking about moving in. My wife’s going to want a glass of champagne. The good stuff. She doesn’t know it yet, but she’s gonna. Me, I’ll try that local brew. Marie. That’s my wife’s name.”
Morgan thought Marie was a lucky woman. And decided she’d been right when the lucky woman came in moments later.
Marie all but melted onto a stool. “God, Charlie. Where has that been all my life?”
She blinked when Morgan set a glass of champagne in front of her.
“Champagne?”
“You deserve it. Eighteen years,” he told Morgan. “Three kids, and our first solo getaway in sixteen years.”
“And now I feel like a princess. I know we’re supposed to dress up and have a fancy dinner, but, Charlie, I’m a wet noodle.”
“Right there with you. Is the food any good in here?” he asked Morgan.
“I can tell you it is. Why don’t you take a booth by the window. I’ll bring your drinks. Take a look at the menu, and if you decide to have dinner here, I’ll cancel your reservation for you.”
“That’s so nice.” Marie just sighed it out. “Everything and everybody’s just so nice. I love this place. Charlie, we owe my sister a great big bouquet for telling us about it.”
While Morgan took care of them, the Jamesons brought their empties to the bar and took stools.
“Another round. Heady Toppers.”
Morgan put the empties into the sink. “Cheese fries with that?”
Mick broke into a grin, and for an instant looked as young as his grandson. “My reputation precedes me. How about it, Liam? Split some, and don’t tell your grandmother.”
“You’re paying? It’s in the vault.”
She plugged the order in, began to draw the beer.
“I don’t know what you said to the couple over there.” Mick nodded in Charlie and Marie’s direction. “But it made them happy. That’s the goal here, make people happy.”
“Hot stone massages had already done that job. They made me want one of my own.” She served the beer, caught the signal Charlie sent her. “Excuse me a minute.” As she walked over, she waved the server over with her.
When she came back, she got out a champagne bucket.
“The Glade’s losing a reservation. Charlie and Marie are dining here: club sandwich for her, steak san for him—hold the onions because Charlie has plans.” She wiggled her eyebrows as she filled the bucket with ice. “They’re capping their first day of their first visit to the resort with a bottle of champagne. The good stuff.”
“Champagne’s on the house,” Mick told her.
“Oh, that’s—that’s great.”
“I’ll just go say hello while you get a bottle chilled. Don’t eat all the fries, Liam.”
“That’s all Mick,” Liam said, shaking his head.
She cashed out the corporate types, made a couple of dry martinis, watched Charlie and Marie clink glasses.
“You’ve got an easy way with a hard job,” Mick observed as he polished off his beer. “I appreciate what it takes to make a hard job look easy. Let’s mosey, partner.” He slapped Liam on the shoulder.
Mick slid three twenties onto the bar. “Keep it up.”
“Thank you, Mr. Jameson.”
“Mick. We’re family here.”
“You ski, Morgan?”
She shook her head at Liam.
“We’re going to fix that.”
“I don’t think so.”
“If it doesn’t involve skis or hiking boots or zip lines, this one doesn’t see the point.”
Mick gave her a wink before they moseyed.
It surprised her to find both her ladies waiting when she got home.
“What are the two of you doing up? It’s nearly two in the morning.”
“First day as manager. We made a pot of tea with our new Vermont tea.” Audrey poured a third cup. “Sit down, have some tea, and tell us how it went.”
“I had to talk her out of coming into the bar, so be glad it’s just tea in the middle of the night.”
Morgan took the tea, then dropped down in a chair near the still-simmering fire. “It went great. I had the meeting with Ms. Jameson—Lydia Jameson—then met with Drea and Nell. Drea said to tell you she misses you at yoga and hopes to make it Wednesday.”
“So do we. Did they like the idea about the specialty drinks, the seasonal ones?”
“I got the go-ahead to try it out. Then I met Mr. Jameson—Mick—and Liam in the bar. So that only leaves out the second generation—Rory Jameson—and the oldest of the siblings, third-generation Miles.”
“The family’s done a great deal for the area.” Olivia sipped her tea. “We get a lot of business—and so does the rest of downtown Westridge—from people staying at the resort.”
“They always have ideas to share. Like you.” Audrey toasted with her teacup. “I definitely think the tea’s going to be a hit.”
“They certainly seem tight—a tight family. I really like working there. And since I am, and I’m drawing a paycheck—and damn good tips—I want to start paying rent.”
“Absolutely not. I said no,” Olivia continued as Morgan started to protest. “I will not take your money. Do I take yours, Audrey?”
“No.”
“And there you have it. I’d have been alone in this house without Audrey, and I likely couldn’t have kept it. Too much for a woman my age all alone, and too empty. Now I have you here as long as you want to stay. You’ll make your own home again one day, but for now it’s here. You want some other responsibilities, that’s different. You can make dinner once a month on your day off.”
“You want me to cook?”
“Your pork chop dinner was really good,” Audrey reminded her. “We didn’t have to lie. You can just stick with that or expand, whatever. Mom and I like to cook, but it’d be nice to have a meal we didn’t cook ourselves or bring home.”
“Preparing a meal teaches independence,” Olivia added. “I’m always surprised you don’t, since that’s your middle name.”
“My middle name’s Nash.”
“Exactly.” And Olivia smiled with it. “And you can start saving up to buy a car, one that doesn’t have your mother and me worried every time you drive off in it. We can be grateful to Nina’s family and still know that’s a breakdown waiting to happen. I can use peace of mind more than money.”
“All right.”
“We’ll be gardening soon, and can use your help there.”
“And, Jesus, child, stop snipping at your own hair.” Olivia rolled her eyes. “Go to the salon. Styling right down from the shop does good work.”
Morgan pushed a hand at her hair. “I thought I was doing okay with it.”
“No.” Audrey spoke definitely. “I know you’ve made a budget. That’s her second middle name,” she said to her mother. “Budget in hair. You meet the public every day now. You need to look your best.”
“A facial wouldn’t hurt.”
Now Morgan slapped both hands on her face. “My face!”
“Is beautiful.” Audrey smiled and soothed. “But you need some pampering. They do amazing facials at the resort, and you’d get an employee discount. You need to treat yourself. Now we should all treat ourselves to some beauty sleep.”
“I’ve got the dishes. I can sleep till noon if I want.” Wouldn’t, Morgan thought, but could.
“Night then.” Audrey wrapped her in a hug. “Congratulations on your first day as manager.”
As Morgan dealt with the dishes, she considered that she’d always lived in a female household. Her father had so frequently been absent, then just gone. Then she’d lived with Nina.
But she’d never been outnumbered, two to one.