Legal Action - Box Set (23 page)

              “You’ll have to sign for it, ma’am, its return receipt requested,” the postman said, and she signed and stood up and walked away from the little group.

              “Oh dear Lord, is it about my boy?” Georgina called after her, as Charlotte walked out into the lane and opened the letter.

              It was from the offices of Sheppard and Sheridan and it said their client, Alexander Bly, had filed a petition requesting a paternity test, and contingent upon the outcome would demand sole custody of the child, Atticus Hunter.

              “No, it’s from my former law office in California, don’t worry, Georgina, it’s nothing important. I’m going for a walk, I’ll be back in a while,” she called over her shoulder as she started walking, her mind was reeling but her step never faltered.

END LEGAL ACTION BOOK 2

LEGAL ACTION 3

PART ONE

THEN…

CHAPTER ONE

              Charlotte waited in the car outside the bank biting her nails and examining her hair for split ends. She was nervous and it was damned hot even with the air conditioner going full blast.
Ugh
, she thought,
stupid Mississippi heat and my crazy Mother, what a great summer this is bound to turn in to
.

              “Buckle up, darlin’,” her mother sang, slipping behind the wheel of the Chrysler Lebaron, “we’re gonna ride, Sally, ride!”

              “Oh, mom, please,” Charlotte fastened her seat belt, scooted down in her seat and turned on the radio.

             
“If it makes you happy, then it can’t be that bad! If it makes you happy, then why the hell are you so sad?
” Sheryl Crow crooned while Charlotte’s mother put down the top of the convertible.

              “Put this sunscreen on and I mean now, you know you’ll be red as a beet in two seconds. I mean it Charlotte, I don’t want you tanning that pretty skin of yours, after all, the Goth look is in, right? Now, ‘Miss I Don’t Wanna Be Seen With My Mother,’ look here what we’ve got! Five, count ‘em, five credit cards and barely a cent charged on any of them! I even had that CD player installed just yesterday and picked up some good music for us to listen to. So you might as well get glad in the same pants you got sad in, cuz we are going on a road trip!”

              Her mother drove past the Greenleaf City Limits sign going fast and rolled her eyes as Sheryl Crow really belted the lyrics out, then she popped in a Pearl Jam CD and looked happy again.

              “Mmm, Eddie Vedder, how can you not be in love with him? Lord what I wouldn’t do with that man, any other man would just be a waste of my time,” her mother said, and started another one of her coughing fits. She fished a hanky from her purse, held it to her mouth and drove right on out of Greenleaf, Mississippi.

              Police lights flashed before they got ten miles down the highway and as they steered to the side of the road and Charlotte turned to watch the deputy walking toward the car, her mother searched around in her purse. Charlotte thought she must be looking for her driver’s license but she pulled out a tube of fuchsia lipstick and concentrated on her lips in the rearview mirror as she applied it. The deputy tapped on the window and her mother lowered it without looking away from the mirror.

              “Ya gotta admit, Wayne, I look good for just having turned thirty,” she said and tugged at the imaginary lines at the corners of her eyes, then she turned her dazzling pink smile on the deputy.

              “Where in the world are you headed in such a hurry, Sally McCall? I didn’t exactly have my radar gun ready to clock ya cuz I was just on my way in to town, but girl you were doing eighty five or ninety, at least!”

              “Awe deputy, you know this old car won’t go that fast. Shoot, we’ll be lucky to make it to Pass Christian without breaking down,” Sally said.

              “Pass Christian? Ya’ll goin’ to the beach, you and your little girl?” he asked, looking at Sally like she was a cupcake he could just gobble up.

              “Yes sir, but mostly we’re going to pay my mother a visit. She’s never met my girl Charlotte, and with me being sick and all…”

              The deputy looked away then; everyone in town knew Sally McCall was living on borrowed time. Her emphysema was getting worse even though she was still a young woman. Some said the disease ran in her family because her daddy died of it fairly early in his life. Others said it was because she’d chain smoked for years and worked in smoky old honky-tonks ever since she was old enough. Whatever the cause, it was obvious the death knoll had sounded for Sally and that was all there was to it.

              “Well that’s nice; I guess I forgot you grew up down on the coast. Listen here Sally, slow it down some, you got the girl to think of and no need havin’ yourself an accident, good day to ya both,” he said, and touched the brim of his hat as he walked away.

*

              Sally and Charlotte spent the night in a Best Western then drove in to the sleepy little town on the edge of the Gulf of Mexico the next morning. Charlotte didn’t want to act like she cared but as she leaned out the window and took in the pristine southern beauty of the historic mansions and moss draped oak trees, her heart was in her throat. This was where her secretive mother had grown up, here in this dream of a town. When Sally turned the car into a long gravel driveway shaded by a canopy of overhanging willows with a white columned house at the end, Charlotte felt dizzy with excitement.

              As they came to a stop in front of the grand Georgian style house, Charlotte could only stare. She and her mother lived in a one bedroom apartment on the bad side of a bad town. This was where her mother had spent her childhood, in this ‘
Gone with the Wind
’ gorgeous mansion?

              “Holy shit, Mom! This is my grandmother’s house? Please don’t tell me your family are like some sort of bigoted plantation people, ugh, I would die, I mean that’s so
not
okay. Seriously, I could not deal with being related to a bunch racist old rich people,” Charlotte chattered on as her mother climbed out of the car and stood looking at the huge house with resigned anguish on her face. “Mom are you okay? Earth to Mom?”

              “May I help you?” an attractive woman in her early fifties stood on the front porch in a loose linen dress and canvas espadrilles, her hands clasped behind her back.

              “I’m Sally,” Charlotte’s mother said quietly, “Sally McCall, is my mother at home?”

              “Oh!” the woman said and simply stared at Sally and then at Charlotte for several minutes. “Come in of course, I’m Louisa, Mrs. McCall’s assistant, I’ll just tell her you’re here.”

*

              “Sally Anne, are you sure?” a beautiful, slim woman with silver hair pulled back and pinned in a severe bun asked Louisa then she turned to Charlotte’s mother. “Why, I’m sure you’re mistaken dear, my daughter was taken up to heaven when she was just fourteen, but thank you for stopping by, sweetheart.”

              “Mother it
is
me, I’m Sally. I just went away but not to heaven, don’t you remember? I’ve brought my daughter to meet you, this is Charlotte, I’ve been writing to you about her, please say you know me. I’m sick Mother, I need you to take care of Charlotte when I’m gone, tell me you got my letters!” Sally was frantic then, wringing her hands and trying to get the older woman to acknowledge her and Charlotte and the letters she’d been sending for the past six months.

              “Gracious, come sit down and Louisa will serve us some of my sweet pickle peaches, you know they always take the blue ribbon at the fair. Oh my,” she said, tapping a finger to her forehead as she struggled to remember, each finger on her hand had a huge diamond ring. There were strands of pearls at her neck and she wore large pearl earrings, her clothes were stylish and obviously expensive, ankle length pants and a pale blue sleeveless pullover with a matching cardigan tied around her shoulders despite the summer heat. “A man once came from New York City simply to taste my peach pickles; he said he’d never heard of such a thing. Do you remember that, Louisa? What year was that? Oh I think it was when Brendan was just a boy, did you know I had a little boy? He was the sweetest thing, but we lost him and…”

              She walked away and sat in a chair by a bay window and stared out at the wide blue Gulf, unspeaking. Charlotte saw that her hands twisted the sleeve of her sweater and her tears fell so fast and heavy they stained the pretty fabric.

              Sally stood behind her mother and her hand reached forward but she stopped short of touching her. “Mother, I miss him too, every single day. I need you to do this for me, Mother, please. There is no one else, swear to me you’ll take care of your granddaughter. I’ve never asked you for anything…”

              “It’s a big house; Louisa can make up Sally’s old room. It’s just the same as it was before she went away, did you know my girl Sally, maybe you went to school together?” she never turned from the window as she spoke and her voice had no emotion what so ever.

              “You did hear that, didn’t you, Louisa? You’ll welcome Charlotte when the time comes, do you understand?” Sally said as she took Charlotte’s hand and walked out onto the long front porch, her voice had an absolute determination to it.

              “Yes, of course, we have your letters and your home address, good afternoon,” Louisa said curtly and waited for them to leave.

              When they got in the car Charlotte’s grandmother suddenly rushed down the front steps and tapped on the driver’s side window and peered in at Sally. “I know you Sally Anne,” she said, venomously, “How dare you darken my door again? Don’t think you’re fooling me, young lady. You’re daddy spoiled you rotten and he didn’t give a single thought to my sweet Brendan, and you used to run wild in the streets at night. You got yourself in a bad way with that Frenchman, that high and mighty Tremont, a married man! You fucked him then you ran away, I hope you know that was the death of your daddy!” She straightened up and walked away and Louisa patted her arm as she led her inside the majestic house.

              Sally’s face was wet with tears as the car wheels spun on the gravel driveway in her haste to get as far away as possible. Charlotte felt a terrible knot twist in her stomach, watching her mother cry silently, she reached for her hand and held it. Her mother never took her eyes off the road, but she held on to Charlotte’s small hand and squeezed it now and then as her body shook with horror and sadness.

              “She’s crazy Mom, Alzheimer’s or something, Louisa told me. Grandmother didn’t know what she was saying. Are you gonna be okay? How about we find a Starbuck’s and I’ll treat you to a full fat white mocha with extra caffeine and whipped cream.” Charlotte said, desperate for her mother to become her normal, zany, overly cheerful self.

              “You drive a hard bargain, Charlotte Rose McCall,” she said and wiped at her tears and her smile began to shine again. “I just hate that old woman and I hate even more that she’s all you’re going to have when I’m gone. You’re stronger than she is Charlotte, remember that, and when she’s no longer living my daddy’s money will be yours. Now New Orleans, that’s where we’re headed, we can get a room in a marvelous hotel in the French Quarter and lie by the pool, to hell with the beach… too much sand anyway,” Sally said, as they turned South onto Interstate 10 and drove across Lake Pontchartrain toward the Big Easy.

              They checked in to the Royal Sonesta on Bourbon Street and as soon as they stepped into their room they both collapsed on the queen size beds laughing like crazy.

              “Your mouth is hanging open, baby girl; I guess you never knew some people live like this every day of their lives! I did once, and I left it all behind, but guess what, that’s yesterday’s dirty laundry. Okay, get up and let’s go shopping and get our hair done and buy the best hats in the world, I know just the place!” Sally picked up the phone by the bed and dialed the concierge, “Hi there, this is Sally McCall and I need two cut and style appointments as soon as possible for me and my daughter. Can you set that up, please? Mani/Pedi’s would be good too, thanks; I’ll wait right by the phone to hear back from you, toodles! See how it works, darlin’? You wave an AmEx card in front of people and they trip over themselves to make you happy. I’ve been saving those credit cards in my safe deposit box for somethin’ special, and this Charlotte Rose is that special time.”

              Her mother began to cough again and the sound made Charlotte’s heart hurt in so many different places she couldn’t begin to count them all. She was used to being the too tall, too skinny, poor girl at school, she knew how to turn her feelings off; in fact she had it down to a science. But her mom was a different matter. She acted like her mother was a huge pain in the butt, mainly because Sally was flamboyant and outspoken and much younger than any of the other mothers at the PTA meetings. Charlotte was born when Sally was only seventeen and they looked more like sisters than mother and daughter. Sally was charming and beautiful and never censored a word that left her mouth and she dressed kind of slutty, in Charlotte’s opinion. Still, Charlotte loved her with a fierce and awesome love, it had always been just the two of them and the knowledge that Sally was preparing herself for death caused a hot poker to pierce Charlotte’s already broken heart.

              “Well we’re set, come on darlin’, let’s paint this town red, purple and a whole bunch of other colors!” Sally pulled Charlotte up and hugged her to her frail body and buried her face in her daughter’s silky hair. “I love you more than anything my sweet baby, you’ve been worth everything to me and don’t you forget it.”

              Charlotte let her mother hold her for a while, she wanted to cry and she wanted to scream, ‘don’t leave me, I love you and I can’t live without you’ but she didn’t. She moved her hands lightly to her mother’s back and gave her a small hug, it made her even sadder to feel the bones outlined just beneath the skin and to feel her mother’s lungs working hard to take in air.