“He said there was no blue in here.” Kari nodded and looked around as she did. “Good heavens, this room is beautiful.”
It was too. The bed was covered in a large coverlet that she bet was handmade. The dressers, three of them, were large and bright with polish. Beth thought them to be oak, but she’d never known one kind of wood from the other, just knew what she liked. The large fireplace was empty now, but there were two chairs flanking it of a same soft ecru color that the spread was made of. There were small pillows in each of them, both covered in the same material as the bed. There was a small secretary in the corner that held a laptop, as well as a television mounted on the wall that looked as big as her single bed at home. All around the room were pictures, and Beth walked to one set of them on the mantel.
They were of her children. Aster was smiling, and Steele was looking at her fondly. They looked like they were on a boat somewhere. She started to turn and ask Kari about it, but was startled to see she was alone. Alone except for the pretty young ghost that stood near the door.
“I could leave if you want.” Beth shook her head at her daughter. “I asked Kari if I could see you alone. I didn’t know what to say to you, so I thought if I made you cry, no one would see how stupid I was.”
“You’re not going to be stupid.” Aster smiled and Beth did as well. “You look like I did as a child. I never had that spark I can see in your eyes here, but you are my child.”
Aster looked at the picture that Beth was talking about. “Steele and I were invited to all kinds of parties as children. We rarely got to go, but we bargained with them about something…I think it was a party that Mother…Eloise wanted us to attend. We’d go and they’d let us go on this outing. We had so much fun that we didn’t want to leave.”
Beth put the picture back and looked at her daughter. “I never knew about either of you. They told me…when I had what I thought was just a son, they told me he had strangled on his cord and that it was my fault. At the time I believed them; but later, much later, I looked it up. There was nothing I did to have caused it.”
“I’ve been searching around about what really happened that day. Did you know that the men that were in the delivery room were not even doctors? Well, one of them was, but the rest were lawyers. As soon as Steele was born, they took him away to the nursery, and then when I was born, a big surprise, they had to scramble to figure out what to do then. Apparently it was set all along for you to be told you had a still-born. Grandmother had no idea that there were twins before we were born or that you’d been told we were dead.” Beth had already figured that part out. “When Grandmother found out and you disappeared, she more or less blackmailed them into raising us. I guess their plan had been to kill us, but once it was public knowledge that they had us, they were stuck. Anyway, that was what I found out. I think it’s all bullshit myself.”
Beth laughed. She couldn’t help it. Aster was so fresh and young, her temperament so funny and honest. When she sat in one of the two chairs, Aster sat in the other. Beth looked at her and wondered, not for the first time, how anyone could do what the Bennetts had done to them and not go crazy.
“I’d like for you to consider staying here.” Beth started to shake her head. “Father is coming for them. And when he does, he’ll harm Kari in a way that there will be no children for them. There will be nothing much left of her after he’s finished. He has a monstrous hatred for Steele, and he’ll harm whoever he loves to get back at him. He blames his suicide on Steele.”
Beth stood up and went to her cases. She was going to have to go now. If Bennett was coming, she wanted nothing to do with him. Or the rest of them. Beth didn’t owe them anything.
“This is not any of my concern.” Aster didn’t say anything, but Beth didn’t care, she was not staying. “You can’t expect me to come here and fight with him. I have…do you have any idea what he’s done to me? How much I’ve had to change my life just to be able to function again?”
“Yes.” Beth picked up one of the cases and turned to her daughter as she spoke again. “Do you have any idea what he’ll do to Steele if you don’t stay and help? And to me? He will harm us all. Kill Kari, as well as anyone else that gets in his way. And Kari will…she’ll fight him with all she is, only to come up short. I love her and don’t want that to happen, do you?”
“I don’t care.” But she did care. He was her child and if Kari had a child, it would be her grandchild. “I can’t help them. I can’t hardly help myself.”