Total pages in book: 143
Estimated words: 132834 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 664(@200wpm)___ 531(@250wpm)___ 443(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 132834 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 664(@200wpm)___ 531(@250wpm)___ 443(@300wpm)
“I can’t imagine the schools there are any good compared to Richmond,” she said, tipping her head back so she could look down her nose at me. From my vantage point, she just looked silly.
I thought about her comment and realized she knew nothing at all about our lives. Maybe this whole thing was just that simple. She missed her grandson, and she wanted to be a part of his life again. It’s not like she could approach me with an apology like a normal person. I’d never seen the woman apologize for anything in all the years I’d known her. She just maneuvered and manipulated until she got her way.
A little voice—the nice Savannah—prompted, Doesn’t she deserve the benefit of the doubt? At least a little? I lost my husband. Nicky lost his father. But Lydia lost her son. I couldn’t imagine how I could live with losing Nicky. How much worse it would be if I’d tried my best to save him and lost him anyway. She’d loved Oliver so much, and Nicky was the only piece of him left. A part of me despised Lydia, but the mother in me had to give her a chance.
Taking a sip of tea, I answered her question. “Nicky is attending Laurel Country Day School as part of my compensation package.”
Her eyes widened, and she sat back. “Laurel Country Day? That’s quite a good school. I have a friend in town whose children went there. Her oldest went to Duke, and the other is at UVA. And Nicky’s tuition is covered as part of your compensation?” she asked, her eyebrows knitting together.
She looked at me doubtfully, as if I couldn’t understand how my own compensation package worked. Did she forget I had a career in Human Resources for years before Oliver died? Probably. Lydia had always seen my true role as a womb-in-waiting for her future grandchildren.
Give her a chance, I reminded myself.
“Yes,” I answered. “Griffen and Hope Sawyer insisted.”
Lydia’s confused look sharpened. “And you’re not”—she wiggled her eyebrows—“you know . . . with the Sawyer heir? This Griffen?”
My tea cup froze halfway to my mouth. What the hell? With completely false pleasantness, I said, “Did you just suggest I’m trading sexual favors for tuition? With my boss?”
“Savannah,” Lydia said in a chiding tone, “You don’t have to be so vulgar.”
“Oh, is that not what you meant? I must have misunderstood.”
Struggling with the whole give her a chance thing, I let the silence build for a few seconds. We both knew I hadn’t misunderstood anything.
Lydia had the grace to keep her mouth shut.
With another coolly pleasant smile, I explained, “The other boys at Heartstone also attend Laurel Country Day, which is lovely for Nicky. August is a bit ahead of him, and Thatcher is in the middle school, but it made it so much easier than feeling like he was starting a new school by himself. He’s doing very well. He’s not wild about reading, but his teacher said he’s above grade level in math. If you ask him, he’ll tell you his favorite subject is recess.”
See? I’m being nice, I congratulated myself.
Lydia sat back, seemingly lost in thought, and sipped her tea. Not eager to restart the conversation, I did the same. I wasn’t sure what she wanted, other than to be a jerk. I was trying to give her a chance, trying to be kind, but every instinct I had told me to get the hell away from Lydia Harris.
Chapter Thirty-Four
SAVANNAH
Setting her teacup back in the saucer with a decisive click, she said, “Savannah, I came all the way down here because I felt like I couldn’t make myself clear through text. John and I just aren’t happy with this separation from Nicky. You’ve kept us apart for far too long.”
I wrapped cold fingers around my teacup, doing my best to harness my temper again. I was trying, but she wasn’t helping. Not in the slightest. I could put up with a lot, but I was finished with Lydia blaming me for everything that went wrong in her life.
“If I recall,” I said as evenly as I could, “you told us to leave and never contact you again. You and John both blocked my phone number.” At the time, it had been a shock. I didn’t remember much from Oliver’s funeral. We’d all been grief-stricken, drowning in pain, and I hadn’t understood that they really meant it when they told me never to contact them again. I called and texted later to try to work things out. When I finally realized they’d blocked me, I sat and stared at my unread messages in shock, weeping from the loss.
Lydia let out a tinkle of a laugh and shook her head. “Oh, dear, Savannah. I’m so sorry. You misunderstood. First of all, I never meant that to apply to Nicky. Of course not! I was never angry with my grandson. I was angry with you.” Her smile held an edge of triumph, as if she’d been waiting for years to deliver that line.