“That’s the only reason? I heard you telling Kenny you’d do weddings and deb parties. You always said you hate working society gigs.”
“I still do,” Billy said. He folded the paper in half. “Okay, if you must know, things are a little tight for me, finance-wise.”
Scott sank down onto the black-leather-and-chrome sofa. “How tight? No bullshit. Tell me the truth.”
“Truthfully? I’m flat busted.” Billy slouched down on the sofa, not wanting to meet his partner’s searching gaze.
Scott tipped a finger under Billy’s chin. “Tell me what happened.”
“Three words. Wendell fucking Griggs.”
Scott’s eyes widened, but he kept quiet.
“You can’t tell Riley, okay?” Billy said quickly. “She’s got enough on her mind without worrying about me.”
“I’d never,” Scott swore.
“Okay, here it is. A little over a year ago, in early spring, Wendell called and asked if he could take me to lunch. I was curious, of course. I mean, we’ve never been what you’d call lunch buddies. I was here on the island, helping Mama open up the house, so I met him for lunch at the club. I knew he was working on some big deal on the north end, and I knew Riley was dead set against it, but hell, I wanted to see what he had planned.
“It was beyond anything I would have imagined. I knew he’d been talking to the hotel people, but now there was the hotel, and a whole new retail shopping village, apartments, condos, another golf course, and marina. It was wild. If anybody else had come up with that scheme, I would have told them they were nuts. But it was Wendell Griggs! He had everything laid out, renderings, maps, financing.”
“But he needed a little more financing,” Scott guessed.
“He had an eye on a tract of land—it belonged to the Holtzclaws, and he and my dad had been trying to buy that parcel for years. Old Miss Josie had gone into a nursing home, and Wendell told me he had an option to buy the land—but he needed to move fast—faster than the bank would take to free up the financing. It would be an investment for me—a great investment with a guaranteed return of twenty-five percent interest.”
“So you gave him the money.”
“Why wouldn’t I? He’s family. It was a sure thing,” Billy said bitterly.
“How much?”
“Everything I had left in my trust fund. A million and change. Which is why this piano man is hitting the road again.”
“I wish you’d talked to me before giving Wendell any money,” Scott said with a sigh. “You know, you don’t have to do this. I’ve still got my work.”
“No way. I’m twenty years younger than you. I’m not gonna be a kept boy toy.”
Scott didn’t bother to argue the point. “At least, tell me you had a lawyer draw up some kind of loan document, some kind of promissory note, anything on paper.”
“Nothing,” Billy said. “Strictly a handshake. Wendell called it a gentlemen’s agreement.”
* * *
Of course, there’d been nothing gentlemanly about his financial arrangement with Wendell Griggs. And virtually nothing he’d just told Scott about his meeting with Wendell was true, because the truth would mean the end of everything Billy cared about.
From the moment he’d sat in that ruined car, faced with the knowledge that he’d caused Calvin Peebles’s death, he’d known he owed a terrible debt to his brother-in-law. There were no nights Billy didn’t grapple with the seeds of the guilt and self-hatred that had been sown that night.
He’d climbed in and out of the bottle half a dozen times since then, but on that chilly early spring day he was cautiously celebrating three months of sobriety.
As soon as he answered the door that day and saw Wendell standing there, holding a liter bottle of Stolichnaya, Billy felt his grip slipping away.
“Hey, buddy,” Wendell said, flashing his huge salesman’s smile. “I was in the neighborhood and I thought I’d drop by and see how you’re hanging.”
Billy nodded at the bottle of Stoli. “Do you always just happen to have a bottle of vodka when you’re tooling around the island?”
The smile dimmed only a little. “My mama taught me it’s rude to drop in on somebody empty-handed. You are gonna invite me in—right?”
Billy swallowed hard. “Do I have a choice?”
Wendell pretended to look hurt. “Did I come at a bad time?”
It had taken him a little while to get down to brass tacks. Wendell hadn’t been in the firehouse since the restoration was completed, so now he asked for a tour, feigning interest in every last brass doorknob and hand-forged hinge.
They’d ended up in the living room. The floor-to-ceiling sheer curtains were open and the sunlight illuminated trees outside just beginning to bud out.
“I didn’t realize what an unbelievable view you have here,” Wendell said, settling himself on the sofa. “I might want to get the name of the architect you worked with, for when we get cooking on the north end development. There’s an old smokehouse on one of the lots, and seeing this gives me an idea we might just want to save it instead of tearing it down.”
“There was no architect,” Billy said flatly. “I came up with the ideas and Scott drew up the plans. But thanks.”
“I didn’t know you were such a talented designer,” Wendell said. “Maybe I’ll hire you to consult on the smokehouse.”
“I doubt anybody would pay me for my ideas,” Billy said coolly. “But I’d be happy to take a look at it if you like.”
“That’d be great!” Wendell exclaimed. “In fact, the reason I stopped by here today has to do with the north end. I’ve got a little investment opportunity I think you might be interested in.”
“I don’t know,” Billy said slowly. “I’ve sunk most of my working capital in the firehouse. Everything cost a hell of a lot more than I’d anticipated.”
“You don’t have to tell me about construction and development costs. I’m living it twenty-four-seven right now. But here’s the thing, Billy. I really don’t think you want to miss out on this deal. It’s kind of a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. You know what I mean?”
There was no threat, no bullying, nothing so gauche. Everything was implied. And Billy knew the rest was just a formality.
“I’ve got an option on the Holtzclaw land. You know the house, right? The old lady’s finally gone into a nursing home, and I think I’ve about got her son persuaded to sell. The thing is, I gotta move fast, before he changes his mind. There’s no time to go to the bank, so naturally, I thought about you, thought I’d give you first shot at a sure thing.”
Billy swallowed hard. “How much?”
“One point two million,” Wendell said quickly.
“For that falling down wreck on Fiddler’s Creek?”
“It’s not the house. It’s the land. It’s the lynchpin for the whole project, especially the new marina.”
“Marina? I thought you were just talking about a hotel and some new houses.”
“No, man. This is big. The hotel’s the anchor, then we’ll have the new marina, condos, apartments, a new retail village, luxury estate lots, all of it. It’ll be the biggest thing to hit this coast in the past twenty-five years.”