two thousand, was nestled in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. German, English, and Scottish migrants had settled this part of Virginia’s frontier in the mid-eighteenth century, and for a generation, farms around Bluestone had been connected to the outside world by only the Great Wagon Road. The railway had never made it as far as Bluestone, but eventually the interstate had skirted by close enough. In the last decade, the creation of wineries and cideries had brought boomers and millennials to the area looking for a slower pace of life.
“I’m excited to see Woodmont Estate,” Sierra said. “I didn’t get to go on the walk-through two weeks ago.”
“They’ve done an amazing job of restoring the gardens.” Libby drove through the town center, dutifully following the speed limit, and accelerated only as she passed the forty-five-miles-per-hour sign.
Virtually closed to the public since it was built in the eighteenth century, Woodmont sat on two hundred acres that rolled along the James River. Ezra Carter had built the two-story house, made of hand-molded brick, after he had received a land grant from King George II. The Carter farm had begun growing tobacco but had shifted to wheat production as prices soared for wheat during the Seven Years’ War. Ezra Carter’s savvy ability to read the markets had made the Carters one of the wealthiest families in Virginia for generations. Elaine Grant, the current descendant, had embarked on a massive renovation of the property, but it was rumored the family finances were dwindling.
When Libby was a kid, the estate had opened only once a year for Historic Garden Week, and for several years in a row, she and her mother had visited Woodmont. Even then, the walled gardens had shown signs of age. Many plants, though still pretty, had been overgrown and in need of pruning or replacing. The garden, her mother had said, was due for an overhaul. Libby had never seen the imperfections in the encroaching wildness. For her, the gardens had been a rare magical escape she shared with her mother.
The estate had never been open to weddings or events until today. The bride, Ginger Reese, had grown up on the estate, playing on the grounds her parents had tended. Her father had been the estate’s manager while her mother, Margaret, had overseen the inside of the house. These days, her brother, Colton, managed the grounds as their late father had, and her mother still ran the house.
Today’s wedding was a kind of trial run for the property. Ginger had reached out to Libby via her wedding photography website, hiring her because she was local to Bluestone and familiar with the venue. Ginger was an ob-gyn in Charlottesville. And her groom, Cameron Walker, was a surgeon at the UVA Medical Center.
Thunder rumbled in the distance. “Did Ginger rent the white tent?” Sierra asked.
“No. She said a tent tempted the law of attraction and would invite rain,” Libby said.
“Are you kidding?” Sierra shook her head. “If that’s how the law of attraction works, then I have a bone to pick with it. Not once did I manifest this life I have.”
Libby could not laugh off Sierra’s sarcastic quip stuffed with bitterness. She too had never pictured or imagined any of the lost babies, the divorce papers, or her father’s funeral. And yet they had shown up one by one, ready to reiterate that bad luck lived by its own rules.
Clouds hovered over the mountains. “So much for positive thinking.”
“As of yesterday, the chance of a downpour was twenty percent.” Sierra glanced at her phone, her brow rising. “It’s now fifty percent.”
“Think we’ll beat it?”
Sierra shook her head.
Libby turned down a smaller road and drove past a sprawling vineyard built thirty years ago by a New York investor whom none of the locals had met yet. Beyond that were long stretches of fencing and rolling hills dotted with grazing cows.
Out-of-town folks dependent on GPS often had trouble locating the Woodmont Estate. Two weeks ago, upon her arrival for the walk-through, Libby had overshot the final turn by a few miles. It had taken an extra ten minutes before she had righted her course and finally spotted the brick pillars surrounded by fully blooming yellow-and-purple pansies.
Now, confident in her approach, she spotted the final turn and followed the long gravel driveway flanked by white oaks that dated back to the War of 1812. According to her mother, the planting of the trees had been by design because they consumed so much water