Summer's End (Wildflowers #5) - Jill Sanders Page 0,81
people to sign up on her first day. She also added a painting class and more than ten people signed up for that one. She’d held it outside on the beach, which had drawn even more people the following day.
She even volunteered to help out for a few dinners that hadn’t been on her schedule, just to avoid the conversation with Aiden.
She was walking to the dining hall to grab some dinner on one of her nights off when her phone rang. She was shocked to see her father’s number on her screen and answered it after the third ring.
“Hello, Dad.” She moved over to sit on one of the wood benches that Liam had built for around the campgrounds.
“Aubrey.” Her father’s voice sounded stronger than the last time she’d spoken to him in the hospital. “John has informed me that you’ve left the state.”
So, it had taken Dr. Williams telling her father that she’d left town in order to get her dad to call her.
“Yes, I returned on Tuesday.” She relaxed back and watched couples shuffle towards the pool bar or the dining hall for lunch.
“I would have thought we would have talked before you left,” her father said.
“I think you said everything you wanted to say to me at the hospital.”
The phone was silent and, for a moment, she thought that the call had dropped.
“John has filled me in on my recent behavior.”
She was silent, waiting for him to say anything further. The entire time she’d known her father, he had never apologized for anything. As the silence grew, she knew today wouldn’t be the day he started.
“And?” she prodded.
“He’s changed my prescriptions and removed alprazolam from my regimen. I’ve also changed a few things around with my security.”
Closing her eyes, she shook her head. “So, Bridgett?”
“I’m told she was released.”
“She was?” She sat up and stared into the darkness. “Why would they let her go?”
“There was no proof that she’s the one who slipped the pills into the decanter,” he countered.
“No.” She felt her anger boiling again and stood up to start marching down the pathway, this time heading to somewhere less populated. “Of course not. Did you call me to accuse me again?”
“No, John seems to think that the alprazolam was in my system a lot longer than just one day. Which means, it was there before you arrived to town.”
“Well, at least that’s something,” she said dryly.
“I’ve let Martha go,” her father shocked her by adding.
She stopped dead in her tracks. “You believe Martha…” She couldn’t fathom the audacity of her father. Martha had worked her him for several years. “You believe someone who’s been loyal to you would, what? Suddenly poison you and force you to change your will so that she still received nothing? Father, you’re blind as well as stupid.” She almost hung up, but her father jumped in.
“I never said that.” She waited. “I let her go because she didn’t stand up and say anything to me about how Bridgett was acting. She even signed the forced will as a witness.”
Aubrey thought about that. “Why?” She shook her head. “Why would she go along?” She would have thought the woman would have at least called Dr. Williams. It hadn’t even registered that her father’s loyal housekeeper and assistant, someone who had controlled her father’s every move for the past few years, had allowed Bridgett to rush in and rule the roost.
“That’s why I let her go. John claims she’s the one who cancelled my yearly physical with him.”
She heard a couple heading her way and ducked down a different pathway. “What happens now?”
“I’ve returned my will to its previous format.”
“I don’t want a dime.”
“I know you don’t, but it’s the least I can do. Hell, when I’m gone, do what you want with it. Give it all to charity for all I care.”
“Then you do it,” she offered.
He was silent for a moment. “That isn’t my legacy to leave. I’ve built up a reputation—”
“Change it,” she challenged him.
He was silent again. She knew he was still there because she could hear him breathing.
“You really don’t care about the money, do you?” he asked quietly.
“I never have. Tell me if you had anything to do with my mother’s death.”
“I didn’t,” he said quickly. “The drugs…” He sighed loudly. “Messed with my mind. Honest, I would have never harmed Nora or you. She’d given me the one thing I had given up hope on long ago.”