“So do I,” Gwen said. “So did my parents. To their dying day, they always wondered what happened to my brother.” She turned her eyes to him. “You are far too good for Mick Malone.”
“That’s not a very high bar,” he said, trying to ignore the surge of feeling from the simple way she held his hand. Then she let it go and turned around to tug the window back open. He helped, and she crossed back into the apartment, leaving him feeling irrationally bereft.
“The carriage is here to take you back uptown,” he heard Hiram tell her.
Gwen would return to her world. That was probably for the best, but he would never forget what she had been for him during these past twenty-four hours.
15
Over the next week, Gwen tried to keep the whirlwind of painful memories at bay by lavishing attention on her house and garden. She pruned herbs and crossbred roses in her backyard sanctuary. In the evenings, she embroidered new wall hangings for the dining room. Her home was nothing like the cold marble mansions where the rest of the Blackstones lived. Gwen always felt out of place in the vacant grandeur of those palaces, and had chosen to live in a warm, cozy home of hand-carved wood, soothing colors, and a splendid garden that felt like paradise.
Perhaps if she had been blessed with children, this house wouldn’t matter so much, but she loved every board, shingle, and windowpane of this home she’d designed and decorated from the ground up. Each room reflected her taste, from the trailing ivy vines carved on the fireplace mantel to the iron hardware inspired by medieval knotwork. Gwen had embroidered the coverings on the seat cushions from her own design of a rose trellis. Rugs loomed by local weavers covered the floors, and tiles from an artisan’s kiln surrounded the fireplace.
Everything in this comfortable home was exactly how she wanted it, which was why she would fight hard to keep it, especially since her husband’s mistress intended to take it away.
It was right after dinner when Vivian arrived on Gwen’s doorstep. Gwen reluctantly allowed her inside, since she didn’t want the neighbors to witness this embarrassing confrontation.
“Jasper would have moved heaven and earth to protect his daughter,” Vivian said as she paced in the parlor. “I think you’re being very selfish by denying Mimi a proper roof over her head and the protection of his name. Those were the only things he wrote in his will. His only dying requests.”
Gwen remained seated at her dining table with the bonsai tree before her, pretending a calm she did not feel as she clipped the miniature tree to maintain its dwarfed shape.
“If Jasper wanted Mimi to have his name, he could have divorced me and married you,” Gwen said. “He didn’t.”
“He couldn’t afford to,” Vivian snapped. “We all know why he stayed married to you.”
The taunt hurt because it was true.
Vivian continued pacing, her gaze traveling over the parlor with covetous eyes. “Are you so selfish that even after he’s dead, you can’t give Jasper his last request? His wishes were clear. The doctor and three other men watched him write that will.”
Gwen hadn’t. In the final days before Jasper died, she’d cleared out of the home they shared and allowed Vivian to move in. It was Vivian who was at his bedside when Jasper died. Gwen didn’t doubt the validity of the handwritten will, for it was perfectly in keeping with Jasper’s desire to give everything he had to the woman and child he loved so desperately.
But Jasper didn’t have the authority to give this house away. He might have given his heart to Vivian, but he couldn’t give her Gwen’s house. Gwen had written Vivian a large settlement check in recognition of Jasper’s intention to see her cared for but had kept the house.
Gwen’s mistake was that she’d done it without benefit of a lawyer. Her husband’s extravagant love for another woman was an embarrassment she didn’t want aired before attorneys, and she assumed the fat settlement would be enough to make Vivian go away.
She was wrong. There was no signed agreement that by accepting the money, Vivian would disavow ownership of the house. Three months ago Vivian had started making demands, claiming that the settlement money was for Vivian, but that Jasper had wanted Mimi to have the house.
“Under no circumstances will I ever leave this house,” Gwen said.
“I’ll take you to court,” Vivian replied. “The will is valid. What kind of mother would I be if I didn’t fight in Mimi’s best interest?”
“And I’ll fight you back,” Gwen said with far more confidence than she felt. The house was titled in her name, but the laws of marital property were a bit of a mystery. Would a sympathetic judge side with Vivian because of the child? She didn’t know, and the prospect of a lawsuit frightened her. She continued twisting a wire around the limb of the bonsai tree, gently bending it into place as she pondered the problem.
“So typical,” Vivian sneered. “You can’t even let that poor tree grow naturally. You clip and groom and twist it into shape, just like you tried to do with Jasper.”
Gwen would not sink to Vivian’s level. “You can throw as many barbs as you like, but you’re not getting this house.”
“I’ll get a lawyer,” Vivian threatened. “As a good mother, I will fight for the rights of Jasper’s child. This house will go to Mimi if it’s the last thing I do.”
The door slammed behind Vivian when she left, and Gwen dropped the pruning shears, her fingers shaking too hard to keep working.
Vivian was wrong about one thing. Gwen never could force Jasper to her will. After she learned about his affair, she’d desperately sought to please him. She quit spending so much time in the garden and tried to improve her appearance. She got manicures to soften her hands. Instead of wearing her hair in its normal braid over her shoulder, she bought heating tongs to style it in spiraling waves down her back, just as Vivian wore hers. Instead of her loosely flowing gowns, she bought tight corsets and tailored clothes—again, like Vivian wore.
Nothing worked. In hindsight, it was humiliating how hard she’d tried to win her husband’s affection, but Gwen would never surrender to his mistress again.
The problem was that Vivian had the will in her possession, and Gwen couldn’t remember exactly what it said. She should have hired a lawyer from the beginning. It would have been humiliating, but she wouldn’t be in this position if she had a lawyer from the outset.
The harsh clang of the telephone broke the silence of the evening.
The telephone was the only thing she disliked about this house. It was like an invader in her home, making her jump at all hours. She sighed and walked to the dim hallway outside the kitchen where the telephone was mounted on the wall. Gwen had tried to liven up the hallway by adding a line of glass tiles from the Tiffany studio at shoulder height. She’d hoped the whimsical tiles in iridescent gold and emerald would be a cheerful sight while dealing with the annoying intrusion of telephone calls.
She lifted the earpiece and spoke into the mouthpiece. “Hello?”
“Is that you, Mrs. K?”
Patrick’s Irish lilt was an immediate balm to her frazzled nerves. How endlessly good-natured he was, and how welcome his voice after the nastiness of dealing with Vivian.