Chapter 14
Edgy,Walker drank only one beer while Sam sipped white wine and admired the sunset. In jeans and jacket, she wasn’t dressed provocatively, but he was so aware of her that it was all he could do to keep from grabbing her hair and hauling her off to hiscave.
Memorieswere tumbling out of her, and the story was fascinating, like a giant puzzle he needed to piece together. He ordered her anotherchardonnay.
“I was sosheltered,” she admitted with a gesture of self-deprecation. “It never occurred to me to wonder where the money came from. I knew my parents were established artists and assumed the income was theirs. When I turned sixteen, Wolf bought methe Subaru, nothing fancy. He said he didn’t want me driving icy roads in anything less than a four-wheel drive, and I just accepted that we had money for new cars. When it came time for college, I received a full scholarship at Brigham, so I never asked about the other costs ofschool.”
“Why environmental science?” He wanted another beer, but one thing led to another, and he was keepinghis head on tight this time around. He wouldn’t let his caretaker neurosis mess with his head again, especially with a woman who was a mystery even toherself.
Sam shrugged. She’d removed her jacket and her slim shoulders lifted her breasts against her loose shirt in a way that had him sucking an emptybottle.
“I’ve always grown plants. I took care of the vegetable gardens and theflowers and it was just something I did. It kept me grounded, as you said earlier.” She paused, as if considering how much to tell him. “I knew agriculture wasn’t for me. I didn’t want a farm. But science... that offered possibilities. My parents were all forit.”
He waited while she gathered her thoughts. She had long, slender fingers and despite the work she’d been doing these pastdays, her nails were neat and well-shaped. His mind drifted to how they wouldfeel...
“And then they were dead,” she said flatly, even though grief shadowed her eyes. “One day I was planning on going home for Thanksgiving, and the next, I had no one to go home to. They had filled my life so completely that I hadn’t realized I had no life withoutthem.”
He remembered the day hisdad disappeared, but at the time, he had hope he’d turn up. It wasn’t the same finality she’d suffered. “Painful memories. I can see where you might want to shut themout.”
“Casswas responsible for shutting down my memory,” she said without equivocation. “I loved my parents, and I know they loved me, even if I was adopted and didn’t think or look like them. Inevertried to shut out theirmemory, even after I learned that they didn’t tell me the wholetruth.”
“Which is?” He could listen to her all evening, which was probably safer than going back to thesuite.
“It took me a while.” She sipped her wine as she worked through her thoughts. “After they died, a lawyer called to say he was executor of their estate and that he’d keep providing for my student housing andallowance as always. He suggested I sell the farm, though, because the artwork had a finite inventory and the income from it would eventually dryup.
“I was too grief-stricken to ask more.” She looked regretfully at the almost empty glass. “Are you sure you want to hear allthis?”
“It’s the best bedtime story I’ve ever heard. What did you do with thefarm?”
“I couldn’t bearto give it up, at first, but then I realized I couldn’t bear to live out there all alone either. So I had the lawyer sell it to an elderly neighbor who had adult children who wanted to live nearby. I thought my parents would approve of that. It was only at that point that I started questioning where my allowance camefrom.”
“You said it was in atrust?”
She nodded. “The SamanthaMoon Trust, and it had been established shortly after my birth, which finally made me wonder about my birth parents. I knew I was adopted and had never cared to knowmore.”
“But you were suddenly without family and started looking around.” Everything she was saying was sensible. But somewhere, the crazy came in. “How did you do that and still keep up yourstudies?”
“Not well,” sheadmitted. “The Mormons have one of the biggest genealogy databases in the world, and I simply didn’t have time to sort through it. After I realized Jade and Wolf had been born in San Francisco, I wondered if maybe I had been too, so I checked California adoption records and discovered I was born to Zachary and Susannah Tolliver. But I couldn’t find anything in the database for either of them. That’swhen I gave up and hired aprofessional.”
“A professional genealogy researcher? I wish I’d known you’d done that. I could have saved Sofia the trouble of digging.” Although would he have taken Sam’s word? He ran his hand up and down his empty bottle—until she abruptly stood up and almostfell.
“We need to read your laptop to see what your secretary found out aboutCass.” She steadiedherself on the table. “I know Cass raised my birth father as her own, because she told me so, but she didn’t give me the wholestory.”
Standing, Walker laid down cash for the bill and grasped her elbow to lead her out. “You’re not used toalcohol.”
She laughed. “Mormons, remember? Only one of my friends drank, and we didn’t have money for anything except cheap beer. No matter howI tried, I never fit with the crowd anyway. By the time I graduated, I desperately missed my parents and their more liberal views. I hoped to find others likethem.”
Others? As in other artists? People with brown skin? Walker wanted to know more, but he had to stick to the case. “So you somehow found Cass inCalifornia?”
“The genealogist did. She traced census reports and addressesand thought Cass might be a relation because of the Tolliver name and her location. She could only find a mail-drop for her in San Francisco. I was prepared to start knocking on doors if necessary, but Cass finally responded to myletter.”
“And she agreed to meet you in the restaurant in Monterey?” Walker helped her into the Explorer and hurried around to the driver’s side to hear the restof thestory.
“I told her I’d never seen the ocean. I don’t know why she didn’t suggest San Francisco. Maybe it’s too big a city for me to drivein?”
“Probably, or too big for Cass to handle anymore. She pretty much lives in Hillvale these days, although I guess her occasional disappearances are to whatever she has going in SanFrancisco.”
“Anyway, she sent me the GPS as agraduation gift when I told her I would be driving out. I was so terrified of leaving all I knew that the GPS was like someone holding myhand.”
