Unspoken

  He blew out a hard breath. “Okay.”

  “This is a house she’s safe in, comfortable in, trusts. And she doesn’t sleep before the locks are thrown.”

  “What happened, Ellie? Has she ever told you?”

  She leaned against the doorjamb, and he watched her think about answering him. “Ask me again after she agrees to marry you.”

  He rubbed his thumb on the lock, looked back at her.

  “It’s what you think, Bryce, but it’s different too. Some things you just do not want to know unless you have to.”

  He moved his hand and slid it in his pocket. “Yet you think she should get married.”

  “I know Charlotte better than she knows herself. If she declines the money, if she doesn’t marry now, she never will. The past she lives with will always control her life. If I didn’t think this was the crucial choice she had to make, I would never have found you and sent you across her path. You’re a good man, Bryce. She’s got a safe choice. She just needs the courage to make it.” She tilted her head. “But that’s a decision for after you make yours.”

  “What you’re asking isn’t an easy question, Ellie.”

  “No, it’s not. And it would be simpler to agree if the amount was a few hundred million. But it’s eight billion seven. It puts your family at serious risk that what happened to Charlotte could happen to one of them.”

  “I wondered if you’d factored that in.”

  “Elliot Marks out of Atlanta has no family, and John and I debated it for more than a few weeks before placing him as our second choice. If Charlotte says yes, it’s going to be because she wants to give the money away. There aren’t many men I’d trust to handle that. They’d see the power of the money before they saw the potential of it. I think you see the potential of it first.”

  “I’m beginning to. Money is an awkward reason to marry, Ellie.”

  “Charlotte will never marry if her hand isn’t being forced to some degree. That’s the scar the past has left. She won’t even think about it, even though I believe she’d be much happier married. In this rare situation, Fred’s will is a good thing. She can’t avoid the question.”

  “Did you have a conversation with Fred?”

  “I wouldn’t do that to her. But I wasn’t . . . displeased with his decision. He loved her. He provided generously for her if she stayed single, and gave her a reason to marry. I’d say he did the right thing.”

  “Why didn’t he just spend the money?”

  “A question I’ve asked myself more than a few times.”

  “Find an answer?”

  Ellie smiled. “The dividends are four hundred thirty-five million a year.”

  Bryce closed his eyes, then laughed. “Yeah, I see the problem.”

  “Charlotte Graham is Ruth Bazoni.” It wasn’t his news to share, but he didn’t withhold material information to a decision. Bryce turned to face his dad. “You know what—”

  “I remember the case, son.” His dad lit the charcoal bricks in the kettle grill and watched them flame. “An awfully hard thing, what she survived.”

  “Tied to her grandfather’s will is money that requires her to marry. The one guy she should turn to is John Key, and she’s taken him out of the equation. There’s no one else. So she’s going to turn down the money.”

  “You think she should have it.”

  Bryce could feel the weight that came with his answer. “I do.” It was the only thing he was certain about—he thought she should have the money. “I don’t know if she will say yes if I offer, but I feel like I need to make a marriage offer. I’m not marrying her for her money, but the money is the reason for the decision.”

  “I understand the distinction.” His dad sat down in a patio chair and studied him. “You’re seriously thinking of getting married to Charlotte Graham.”

  “I am. The will gives Charlotte three years after Fred’s death to marry or lose the money, and that time is running out. Her best friend admits to having picked me out for Charlotte. She wouldn’t go looking to find a husband on her own, so Ellie took the task on for her. That’s why I ended up being asked to sell the coins. Ellie wanted Charlotte and me to meet.”

  “Are you asking my opinion or are you hoping for my approval?”

  “Your perspective, I guess. I know this is too far off the path to ask for your approval.”

  “It’s not what your mom and I have been praying for,” his dad agreed. “Let’s start with the obvious. It’s more than a little money or you wouldn’t be pacing my patio.”

  “That’s true.”

  “You want her to have the money. Do you think she’s better off with it?”

  Bryce hesitated. “I don’t know.”

  “A wise answer.”

  “I know a day will come when she will regret having turned the money down. I want her to at least have the choice, a real choice, before she says no.”

  “It’s a noble sentiment, son.”

  Bryce took the seat next to his father. He was trying to talk himself into this as much as he was his dad. “God’s not asking me to step forward and solve this problem for Charlotte. He’s not nudging me toward this decision. But neither is there a cautionary note, a ‘don’t ask her’ check in my spirit. A lot of prayer simply keeps giving me the assurance to ‘do what you decide is best.’ And I know Charlotte having a choice matters to me.”

  He leaned forward, rested his hands between his knees. The emotions of the last thirty-six hours had taken a toll. This wasn’t the kind of marriage conversation he had thought he would be having with his dad. There might be no purpose to it. Charlotte had already made clear her decision to stay single and let the money go. But he thought that choice was to protect herself. He remembered the first time she’d mentioned the topic because it had struck him at the time as something so sad.

  “I’m single for life, Bishop. Lots of money, lots of reasons for someone to overlook the baggage I bring. That’s not going to happen. I don’t need the pity. So I’ve built a life I like for myself. I’ll go back to it once Fred’s estate is dealt with. I like my art. I like my friends.”

  He hadn’t known it at the time, but her words were about the Legacy Trust. It hurt knowing the past had left so much damage that Charlotte would avoid something good just to protect herself. And maybe his proposing marriage would simply cause her more pain as she again made the decision to stay single. He didn’t want to cause that. He looked at his father. “The fact she’s Ruth Bazoni is a reason not to ask.”

  “On the contrary, it’s probably the one good reason you should ask. She’s been hurt before. If she wants the money, she has to marry. She’s going to end up in a business marriage, a legal agreement with a guy who takes X dollars and lives elsewhere. She’ll probably see that as the only safe way to proceed, the only safe option she has to protect against being hurt again. She won’t risk a real marriage because of what happened in the past. She deserves something better than that, son.

  “You don’t love her, because you would have led this conversation with that if you did, and that’s going to be a problem. But she deserves a friend. She deserves at least a friend. If you get married, you won’t get divorced. She’ll have you, and by extension this family, for a lifetime. I’d say she needs it. There are worse reasons to get married than to provide a woman a safety net of a good family.”

  “I wouldn’t be letting you down, marrying someone I don’t love, at least not yet?”

  “Are you going to be a good husband to her?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you’ll have my blessing and your mother’s.”

  NINETEEN

  Bryce flipped on the TV and found the game, set the volume on low, then looked over at Charlotte. “I’ve got a new folder of ideas for you to consider and a stack of checks for you to sign. Why don’t you look them over while I fix us some coffee? Then we’re going to talk about the elephant in the room we’ve been ignoring all evening.”

  Charlotte glan
ced at the folder and checks, nodded, and reached for a pen.

  Bryce took his time fixing coffee, trying to sort out what he wanted for the rest of the evening. He could feel the nerves skimming around the edges of his system. Dinner had gone well, the conversation had flowed easily due to the fact they’d both avoided the topic of the Legacy Trust money. He came back with coffee for both of them and took a seat on the couch beside her, placed her cup on a coaster on the coffee table.

  She straightened the stack of checks she had signed. “What does this bring the total to?”

  “Twelve million, seven hundred and twelve thousand. There’ll be no problem giving away the sixty million within a year.” He settled back with his cup of coffee. “Tell me about the day Fred told you about the Legacy Trust.”

  She curled up in the corner of the couch, turning to face him, finally nodded. “I knew about Graham Enterprises from our first meeting, and Fred showed me the coins the year before he died. About six months before his death we were talking about Graham Enterprises and the arrangements he had made to allow the employees he trusted to buy it if I decided to sell the business. Combined, the coins and Graham Enterprises were worth over a hundred fifty million. His advice was to decide what I wanted in my life and for my sister, to keep as much money plus a safety margin necessary to have it, and then make a decision. The rest of the money could be kept intact for the next generation and passed on, or it could be given away.

  “I was thinking I might build a house with a studio and gardens and settle here in the area. I like the Midwest weather, and Ellie was comfortable in Chicago. I was creating possible sketches of the place, and Fred was helping me refine the floor plan for the house.” She paused as she drank her coffee, remembering.

  “Fred said the decision about what to do with Graham Enterprises would be only one of the decisions I would need to make. His father had passed the coins down to him. His grandfather had also passed down the proceeds of a company he had sold.”

  Charlotte stopped, finally reached forward and set her coffee cup down. “Fred didn’t tell me the size of it. He simply said it was large enough he was going to do me the favor of not making it my problem unless I chose to get married and have someone help me with it.

  “I told him I didn’t plan to marry.

  “He said that was fine. His lawyer would handle the details for me whatever I decided. He’d leave the option open for three years after his death. He wanted me to know his own decision had been not to do anything with the Legacy Trust, and he’d understand if I made the same decision.”

  Charlotte reached around for the throw pillow and tucked it behind her. “That conversation, looking back at it now, was such a simple thing for what Fred had told me, and what I had decided and told him in reply.” She half smiled. “It obviously didn’t stay that simple.

  “His lawyer sat me down about three months before Fred died and told me the size of it.” She went silent, remembering. “Not the kind of news you wake up one morning prepared to hear. It was a week before I felt able to talk with Fred about it. Fred simply said the family had been good at business, and he’d been proud he’d been able to be the same. The money was there if he wanted to spend it, and he had decided not to do so. He hadn’t wanted that life for himself. He’d seen his father wrestle with the enormous wealth, and it was a continual pressure. I could decide what was best for me, and he’d agree with it. Fred said he had lived the life he wanted and had no regrets. He wanted the same for me.

  “After Fred died, I told John and Ellie.

  “Ellie and I daydreamed for a while about what could be done with the money—things we could do, places we could go. But our dreams didn’t come close to the value of the coins and Graham Enterprises, let alone the Legacy Trust. The only thing to be done with that kind of money was to control something big like a business the size of McDonald’s or to give the money away through something like the Gates Foundation, where there are hundreds of staff and major initiatives to fund.

  “I’m a sketch artist, Bryce, and I like—need—my privacy. I’m glad Fred gave me a clean out. He could have simply left the trust to me, and I would have no choice in the matter but to manage it somehow. I do have a choice. That matters to me. The weight of this isn’t going to fall on me unless I want it to.”

  She stopped, tilted her head. “You listen well.”

  “I’m trying to.”

  “It would be useful to me to know what you’ve been thinking.”

  Bryce blew out a breath. “I’m still caught by the enormous size of it, and further, what could be done with those funds. It doubles the size of Samaritan’s Purse and World Vision, it strengths and builds thousands of churches, it tackles hunger in a serious way. It’s a choice to do some serious good.”

  “The sixty million looks small against eight billion seven.”

  “Yes. Was what we’ve been doing merely practice, Charlotte? The sixty million? To find out if you could give away a large amount of money quietly?”

  She didn’t answer for a long moment. “Yes. It’s been a learning experience to see what giving sizable sums away would be like. It’s something I needed to know.”

  He set aside his cup, leaned back on the couch, and made his decision. “We could scale it. A combination of macro and micro giving, the same focus on having each dollar matter.”

  “It requires I marry.”

  “Set the condition aside. If it didn’t exist, would you want the money?”

  She looked away, and he turned her head gently back with a finger under her chin. “Simple question. Honest answer. Charlotte, do you want the money?”

  Seconds ticked by.

  “Maybe.” The answer came out like an escaping painful whisper. “I don’t want it feeding a law firm for the next fifty years. It was entrusted to me. I believe Fred wanted me to control the direction, the potential, of it. I would want to give it away.” She shook her head. “If I so much as hint I want it, marrying John comes into play. Ellie knows me. She knows John is the only guy I trust enough to place in that role. Her friendship is priceless to me. No amount of money is worth risking Ellie and me.”

  “Consider marrying me.”

  He didn’t like the pallor that appeared. “Spend your life with me like we’ve been doing the last several weeks, only layered with more. Nothing else changes but another last-name change, and you’ve already adapted to those before.”

  “You haven’t thought this through,” she whispered, “and I don’t want a husband.”

  “You need one,” he said simply. “It’s okay to want the money. It’s okay to know John isn’t the answer. So put together the next plan, don’t simply stop at what looks like a wall. Consider marrying me. Ellie will understand your choice. John will too.”

  “I won’t.”

  He smiled and leaned forward, softly kissed her worried face. “Think about it.”

  Bryce hauled another box of coins to the pallet.

  John pushed his box in beside it. “What did she say?”

  “Not much. She’s got two hundred forty-six days left. Knowing Charlotte, she’ll use every one of them to think about it.”

  “For what it’s worth, I’m on your side,” John said. “It gives you time to convince her to say yes.”

  “You have any ideas on how to do that? Because I sure don’t.”

  John thought for a moment. “Treat her like she has said yes.”

  “Basically ignore the question.”

  “Yeah. It’s worth a try.”

  Bryce thought about it, remembered that pallor, and shook his head. “No, the problem is she’s scared. The only thing to do is to talk about it so much it stops being scary.” He taped together another box. “Why are you so comfortable with the idea of Charlotte getting married, John? Of everyone, I would have figured you would be the least likely to see it as a good idea, given what you know about her past.”

  “Maybe it’s because I do know the details. She’d be in good hand
s with you, Bryce. The money—it can be a problem, a blessing, or just a fact. It’s not going to ensure her happiness. The people around her are the influences on her being happy. Charlotte being married to you—it would be good for both of you. You’d have an interesting life. You’d do something good with the money, she’d have family around her, somewhere to be settled, and she’ll be glad a few decades from now she didn’t turn down the opportunity.”

  “You sound certain this would be a good thing.”

  “I am. I know Charlotte. I don’t think you’ll get her to say yes, but it would be nice if you could.” John leaned against the stack of boxes on the pallet and studied the shelves being emptied. “Another two pallets, we’ll begin to see empty shelves in each section.”

  “I see why Charlotte moved out furniture at Fred’s place just so she could see some progress. Otherwise the job never seems to end.”

  John smiled. “I figure another two months at this pace to clear this vault, add another four to clear vault twenty-two. It’s going faster than I thought.”

  “I hired enough staff for the prep room that they’ve been able to keep up with us. Charlotte packed another five hundred of the individual coins. Let’s take them with us this trip, leave them at the store, so she doesn’t have to make that delivery.”

  “I’ll get them loaded to haul out. There’s time if you want to go find her for an hour.”

  Bryce glanced at his watch. “Maybe.”

  “She’ll be at the admin office. She was helping Henrietta chase down an errant payment.”

  “Why does she keep working like she does?”

  “Think of Charlotte’s work as therapy. It was how she dealt with the aftermath of what happened. She worked. It’s ingrained now. The more stress she’s feeling, the more likely you are to find her working at something until midnight. It’s a distraction.”

  “I hadn’t realized.”