Claire at Sixteen

  “Never,” Evvie said.

  “Then Sybil would be a cripple for the rest of her life,” Claire said. “If that doesn’t bother you, fine. I wasn’t about to let that happen. It was worth being slapped. It was worth using Scotty. It was worth anything I had to do. Because nobody else in this family knows how to raise that kind of money that fast. Only me. So I’m the one who did it.”

  “What are you going to do the next time you need money?” Evvie asked. “Who will you sell your body to then?”

  “The highest bidder,” Claire said. “You’re giving me a headache, Evvie. Do you have any aspirin?”

  “In the bathroom,” Evvie replied. “Get it yourself.”

  Claire got up and walked to the bathroom. She wanted Evvie to be excited for Sybil and proud of her. It wasn’t right she should be acting so righteously. She swallowed the aspirin and splashed some cold water on her face. She could still feel the shock of her grandfather’s slap, but the imprint was long gone. It didn’t matter. She hadn’t gone through all that just to be put on his Christmas card list. When Sybil walked across the room to Evvie, no crutches, no cane, maybe not even a limp, then Evvie would know who to thank.

  “Feel better?” Evvie asked as Claire joined her.

  “A little,” Claire said. “Too much excitement, I guess.”

  “I can imagine,” Evvie said. “Claire, the reason I got so upset is because I love you, and it terrifies me that you play these sorts of games. You got away lucky this time, but someday you’re going to go too far and end up in terrible trouble. You think somehow your beauty will always protect you, but it won’t. Look at Nicky. I don’t want you to end up like that. You’re too smart, and inside you, there’s such a good person, someone so loving and true. That’s the Claire I love, and that’s the Claire I’m afraid you’re going to let die.”

  Claire felt very uncomfortable. “I borrowed your picture,” she said, digging it out of her overnight bag. “I showed it to him. He spent a lot of time looking at it, too. I guess he wanted to see what Nicky looks like, so many years later, and what his granddaughters are like. Here. I hope you didn’t miss it.”

  “You showed him this picture?” Evvie said, taking it from Claire. “You let him look at us?”

  “Yeah,” Claire said. “I did. What of it? You think it’ll have slime prints all over it now? What’s the big deal?”

  Evvie shook her head. “If you don’t understand, I can’t explain it to you,” she replied. “Just leave that part out when you talk to Nicky. It’s his father, you know, and he must hate the man with every fiber of his being.”

  “They look exactly alike,” Claire said. “It was spooky seeing what Nicky’s going to look like thirty years from now. I wish I could have taken a picture.”

  “We’ll get along fine without any pictures,” Evvie said. “Drink your tea. It’ll make you feel better.” She took the picture from Claire and put it down on the table.

  The telephone rang, and Claire jumped up to get it. Maybe it’s Schyler, she thought. Maybe he can’t get me out of his mind. It was Scotty.

  “I can’t talk for long,” he said. “And I can’t talk too loudly. Schyler’s watching out for me, but my parents’ll kill me if they know I called you.”

  “Hi, Scotty,” Claire replied. “Are things still bad over there?”

  “You should have heard the lecture my father gave me,” Scotty said. “And Mom kept crying and hugging and calling me her baby. But Grandfather was the weird one. He just put his arm on my shoulder and muttered something about the sins of the father. I know he doesn’t like Dad very much, but I couldn’t figure out what he was talking about. You were in there with him much longer than I expected. Did he say anything about my father?”

  “He probably meant my father,” Claire said. “I don’t think he has much respect for my family.”

  “Dad asked him if he’d paid you off, and he said yes,” Scotty declared. “So Dad asked him how much, but he refused to say. He just said, ‘Enough,’ and that he’d take it out of my inheritance when the time came. Mom really started crying then, but I think he was kidding. It’s hard to say. He looked ashen. What did you say to him?”

  Claire took a deep breath. “I just made a few threats,” she said. “About what I’d do to you if we stayed married.”

  Scotty laughed. “They must have been some great threats, from the way he looked,” he said. “Schyler says you’re gorgeous, by the way.”

  So’s he, Claire thought, but didn’t say.

  “So have you told your family yet?” Scotty asked. “They’ll be pretty excited that you came up with the money.”

  “I’ve only told Evvie,” Claire said.

  “Not Thea?” Scotty asked.

  “Not yet,” Claire said. “I just got in a few minutes ago. And she isn’t here for me to tell.”

  “That’s right,” Scotty said. “She’s in New York. Will you have any trouble tracking her down? Do you think she’s at Kip’s?”

  “I’ll find her,” Claire said.

  “Give me that phone,” Evvie said, and she grabbed it from Claire. “Scotty, this is Evvie. I want you to know I’m furious about what you did. Now you listen to me. She’s sixteen, Scotty. Stop laughing. She couldn’t have done any of this if you hadn’t been willing to go along with it. You had just as much say as she did. And I don’t like the way you used Claire, yes you used her every bit as much as she used you, to get back at Thea. You have problems with Thea, you deal with her directly. Don’t drag Claire into it. I don’t care if she chased you. I don’t care if this was all her idea. You married her. You risked hurting her, just to hurt Thea. I won’t have it, do you hear me?” She listened for a minute to what Scotty had to say, and then handed the phone back to Claire.

  “That was fun,” Scotty said. “I don’t like being the villain in all this.”

  “I know,” Claire said. “She’s been screaming at me, too.”

  “You’ll tell Thea?” he asked.

  “Yes,” Claire said.

  “Fine,” Scotty said, and hung up.

  Claire put the phone down and realized that that might well be the last conversation she’d ever have with Scotty. Her lover. Her husband. Just a curt request that she tell Thea what they’d done, and an equally curt guarantee that she would. That was what it came down to for him. Just hurting Thea. If Claire had liked Thea, she might even be angry.

  Evvie shook her head. “He kept laughing,” she said. “As if this was all a joke.”

  “It is to him,” Claire replied. “I couldn’t let him take it seriously. If he had, he never would have gone through with it.”

  “What if you hadn’t gotten the money?” Evvie asked. “What if Sebastian Prescott had just refused, thrown you out? What then?”

  “Then I would have done something else,” Claire said. “There’s always a way if you need something badly enough.”

  “How do you think Sybil’s going to feel when you tell her what you did?” Evvie asked. “Proud of you? Or ashamed at how you sold yourself?”

  “You don’t know Sybil,” Claire said. “You think I’m ruthless? I’m as soft as Thea compared to Sybil. The only thing Sybil really wants is to walk again. That’s it. That’s her universe. I could have sold myself to a Singapore brothel, and if it got her the money for the rehab, she wouldn’t care.”

  “How can you say that?” Evvie asked. “Sybil isn’t at all selfish.”

  Claire laughed. “You still think we’re the way we used to be,” she said. “Nicky and Megs slobbering over each other, and Thea writing her poetry, and Sybil hiding her pennies, and me being naughty. It isn’t like that anymore. That car didn’t just hit Sybil, you know. It flung all of us around. Megs sees Nicky is a failure, and Nicky sees that she knows that about him, and all Sybil’s life is, is pain and frustration. I even feel sorry for Thea. She keeps hanging on to Kip, and she would have outgrown him long ago if things were the way they used to be. And I’m not naughty. I don’t pro
voke Nicky for the pure joy of making him angry. I don’t even bother. He’s too pathetic.”

  “You’re pathetic,” Evvie said.

  “Cheap shot,” Claire said. “Not even an accurate one. Scotty’s father called me cheap and whorish, and he was a lot closer to the mark than you are.”

  “Oh, Claire,” Evvie said.

  “Don’t ‘Oh, Claire’ me,” Claire said. “You know, there’s always been something about you I didn’t like. I was never sure before what it was, because for the most part I do like you, much more than I like Thea or Megs or Nicky. But you insist on standing in judgment of me. I won’t have it anymore. I don’t care if you call me pathetic, or say that I’m great. I’m not interested. I’d kill for Sybil. I’d sell my body or my soul, or anybody else’s, to help her. But I don’t care what you think about that or anything else about me. I don’t judge you, Evvie. I don’t care that you’ve been living with a lie for four years now, that the man you love has been lying all his life. I don’t care that you’re a straight-A student, either. And I expect you to stop caring about me. We share the same family, that’s all. It’s an accident of birth. We don’t have to be any closer than Nicky is with what’s-her-name, Scotty’s mother. What is her name, anyway?”

  “Vivienne,” Evvie replied. “You’re my sister, Claire. For me that means caring.”

  “Fine,” Claire said. “Just keep it to yourself. Now, how am I going to get to Oregon? The old man gave me cab fare, but I didn’t think to ask him for a plane ticket.”

  “There should be enough money in the joint account,” Evvie replied. “At least for a one-way ticket.”

  “Good,” Claire said. “I wasn’t looking forward to begging from Clark.”

  “What are we going to tell Clark, anyway?” Evvie asked.

  “Nothing,” Claire said. “It’s none of his business. Will you have enough money for the rent if you buy me the ticket?”

  “Sam always comes back from the Greenes with a check,” Evvie replied. “They worry that he doesn’t eat enough.”

  “I like Sam,” Claire said. “I’m sorry about his mother.”

  “I’m sorry, too,” Evvie said. “About that, and a whole lot more.”

  “Don’t be sorry for me,” Claire said. “I did what I had to, and I don’t regret a thing.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Claire took the same flight to to Portland that Thea had flown two days earlier. She somehow expected the flight attendants to know that, to acknowledge her as Thea’s sister, but of course even if the crew were the same, Claire and Thea looked nothing alike. It was exhaustion, Claire told herself. She’d done more in the past two days than most people did in a lifetime. Marriage, annulment, reunion, exile. All that in less than twenty-four hours. Throw in a Broadway show, and you were entitled to be tired.

  Nicky picked her up at the airport. Claire hadn’t known what arrangements would be made; there hadn’t been time for a phone call, and Evvie had promised she’d work out the details. For the first time that Claire could remember, she was truly pleased to see her father. Apprehensive, but pleased.

  Nicky didn’t hug or kiss her, the way she knew he would any of his other daughters. That didn’t matter. “I have luggage,” she said. “We’ll have to pick it up.”

  “Fine,” Nick said. They found their way to the luggage area, and waited along with everyone else for the appropriate bags. Claire’s were among the first to arrive, and Nicky grabbed them both, then carried them out to the car. It was a much nicer car than the one they’d been driving in Missouri. “Rental,” Nick explained. That was all he said to her until they got into the car. “Fine” and “rental.” Evvie had obviously had a long talk with him.

  “How much did she tell you?” Claire asked as Nicky began the long drive to the motel.

  “Everything,” Nick replied. “We’ll talk about it after I get out of the airport.”

  Claire nodded. Because of the three-hour time difference the plane had come in at a fairly decent hour, but her body clock was still set to Boston time, and she yearned to sleep. She couldn’t sleep in public places; it made her feel too vulnerable. And Scotty had seen to it that they hadn’t gotten much rest the night before. It promised to be a grueling drive.

  Nicky maneuvered the car through the airport traffic, and soon they were on a highway going out of town. “How was the flight?” he asked, as though he cared.

  “All right,” Claire said. “Long. I had to transfer, and I worried about my luggage.”

  “Thea said the same thing,” Nick replied. “Why did she come out, anyway?”

  “She was worried about you,” Claire said. “That you might do something reckless.”

  “So you did instead,” Nick declared.

  “It wasn’t reckless,” Claire said. “There was no risk. If I failed, I didn’t lose anything.”

  “Not even your innocence?”

  “No,” Claire said. “Not even that.”

  Nicky kept his eyes on the road, and drove at a steady pace, not caring if other cars passed him. Under ordinary circumstances, that would have driven Claire crazy. She loved speed, loved the sensation of being the fastest, but tonight she didn’t care. If Nicky wanted to play cautious, she wasn’t going to object.

  “Thea and your mother were out,” Nick declared. “When Evvie called. I’m the only one who knows.”

  Claire nodded. He never called Megs “your mother.” Megs was always Daisy to him. “Where were they?” she asked.

  “Having supper with Sybil,” Nick replied. “Thea’s going back to New York tomorrow, and we’re leaving for Missouri the next day. They were having a farewell dinner together.”

  “Without you,” Claire said. She suspected that Nicky’s forty-eight hours had been as storm-filled as hers.

  “Evvie tells me you married the boy knowing the whole story,” Nick said, ignoring Claire’s comment. “Grace filled you in, and you put two and two together, and you tricked him into marrying you.”

  “I didn’t trick him,” Claire said. “I was completely honest up to a point. He knew I was doing it for the money, and the money was for Sybil. I even told him I’d only take money from his grandfather. I just didn’t say he was my grandfather, too.”

  “Am I supposed to think of that as honorable behavior?” Nick asked.

  “I don’t care how you think of it,” Claire replied. “Someone had to come up with the money for Sybil. You know that.”

  “I could have handled it,” Nick said. “I’m not a fool, Claire. I’m not incompetent. I would have raised the money somehow.”

  “Maybe you would have,” Claire conceded. “But not as fast as I could. Nicky, it was an opportunity. You brought me up to believe in making the most out of opportunities. There he was, just waiting to be picked.”

  “Pick-pocketed is more like it,” Nick said.

  “You’re right,” Claire said. “Fifty thousand is petty cash to a man like that.”

  Nicky laughed. “He isn’t that rich,” he said. “Not unless there’ve been some major changes in the past few years.”

  “He figured he was getting off cheaply,” Claire replied. “I had Scotty and I had you to bargain with. All he had was meanness.”

  “Fifty thousand is more than we need,” Nick said. “Were you planning on that, on overkill?”

  Claire shook her head. “I almost told him no,” she admitted. “But then I figured we could always use the extra money. Especially now that we’ll be relocating in Oregon. I know we won’t be able to buy a house, but we’ll rent a nice apartment, and buy a new car, and that’ll still leave a few thousand for you to get started with. And Megs can get a job, and things’ll be all right again. I’m tired of being poor, Nicky. It might be fine for Thea, maybe even Evvie, but I don’t like it.”

  “I don’t, either,” Nick said. “But that doesn’t mean I’m going to accept this money.”

  The car was getting warmer and more comfortable. Claire rolled her window down just a
fraction to feel the air on her face. “You can’t tear up the check,” she declared. “It’s for Sybil.”

  “Don’t you think I know that,” Nick said. “But there are things you don’t know.”

  “Like what?” Claire asked.

  “Like the agreement I made with him,” Nick said. “Never to take another penny from him. Never to see him again, or have any further contact with him or his family.”

  “You were only eighteen,” Claire said. “None of that was legally binding.”

  “I wasn’t even eighteen,” Nick replied. “Seventeen, just a year older than you. I was terrified, but I had nowhere else to turn.”

  “He’s still scary,” Claire said. She thought about his threat of the acid and how she had known he wasn’t kidding. “What did he say to you that time?”

  “Nothing flattering,” Nick said. “How does he look?”

  “Fine,” Claire said, truly aware for the first time that Sebastian Prescott was Nicky’s father, that she was talking to Nicky about his own father, a man he’d only met once, and then for less than an hour. “He’s very handsome. He looks just like you, Nicky, only his hair is a beautiful shade of white. Very thick, though, like yours. Except for the hair color, the two of you look like brothers.”

  Nicky nodded. “That was how I got in,” he said. “His secretary was so startled by our resemblance she let me through. I’m surprised Scotty’s family didn’t see it.”

  “They were too busy with other things,” Claire said. “Besides, I’m a girl and sixty years younger than he is. I worried about it, but it worked out fine. It was a surprise attack.”

  “Did he …” Nicky cleared his throat. “I mean, what did you think of him?”

  Claire had seen Nicky a lot of different ways over the years, loving with his daughters, passionate with his wife, friendly with business associates, protective, angered, even, on rare occasions, relaxed. But she had never seen him so defenseless before. This is what fathers do to you, she thought. Even if you have no reason to care.