“You’re not going to believe this,” Sudsy Robertson announced to the city council as he burst through the door. He brushed a generous portion of late-December snow from his winter parka and onto the floor of the Palomino Pub.
It was the Wednesday between Christmas and New Year’s, and my life had settled into a calm if somewhat predictable routine. I continued to mark time with life before Leo and life after Leo, but it had been a full month since he’d left town, the phone messages had stopped, and my heart, although not really mending, had at least stopped with the incessant aching. I’d chosen to fill the cavernous void left by his absence with meetings and research and studying our local laws. Gertie continued to be a great resource, but I was starting to surpass her. I couldn’t catch up to her thirty years of experience, of course, but I was smart, and with absolutely nothing else in my life to distract me, I was dedicated.
“Won’t believe what?” asked June Mahoney. She was wearing an ugly Christmas sweater, but I didn’t have the nerve to ask her if she meant for it to be ugly or if she just had bad taste.
“Remember how our community center project got delayed a few weeks ago because we couldn’t find the funding for the necessary repairs?”
I tamped down a sigh. The community center, my pet project, was floating dead in the water. Ryan had found some structural issues with the foundation, and until we could afford to fix that, we couldn’t proceed with the rest, and the money just wasn’t in the budget.
“Well,” Sudsy continued, “we have a benefactor.”
“A benefactor?” Vera asked.
“Yes, someone by the name of . . .” He pulled a letter from the pocket of his kelly-green pants—because even in the winter, Sudsy wore golf clothes. He unfolded it carefully. “It says here . . . Marian Singer Wellington.”
“What?” I gasped, exchanging a glance with Dmitri.
“Yep, she’s some rich old broad from Illinois. Not sure why she’s taken an interest in our little town, but she likes you in particular, Brooke.”
“Me?”
“Uh-huh.” He adjusted his glasses to read from the paper in his hands. “She says she hopes we’ll accept her charitable gift and that the monies should be used at the discretion of the mayor, Brooke Callaghan, with the intention of completing the renovation of our community center.”
“Who is Marian Singer Wellington?” Olivia Bostwick asked. “I’ve never heard of her.”
Dmitri and I exchanged another discreet glance. “She’s an heiress,” he said. “She stayed at the Imperial Hotel a few summers ago. I had a lovely chat with her one day when she was visiting the butterfly garden. She said the charm of the island made her feel twenty years younger.”
That was a complete fabrication, of course, but now I was onto Dmitri’s style. A little lie here, a little lie there, just to keep the general public confused about the truth. It was really quite effective.
“Oh, I remember her now,” I said. “She and her granddaughter came for the Lilac Festival, and we had a long conversation about . . . lilacs.” I wasn’t nearly as good at lying on the fly as Dmitri was. I hoped it wasn’t a skill I needed to develop.
“What kind of donation?” my father asked. He was making an appearance at today’s meeting. Actually, he’d been to all of them since Leo’s abrupt departure. And he’d started showing up at my office with lattes or the occasional doughnut from Tasty Pastries. I knew what he was doing. He felt bad that my relationship with Leo had gone pfffffft. I’d never discussed it with him, and he’d never asked. All he knew was that suddenly the bartender was gone, and I was sad about it.
“What kind of donation, you ask?” Sudsy responded. “That’s the part you really won’t believe. This woman donated twenty-five thousand dollars.”
“Twenty-five thousand dollars?” Every person in the room, except for Sudsy, said it at the same time. Clancy looked up from his spot at the bar. He was down a bartender, so it was just him again.
“Twenty-five thousand dollars,” I said again. “That’s . . . crazy.”
What had possessed her to be so generous? What had Leo and Gina told her about our little island that had made her want to do that? I’d have to send her a thank-you note, but I didn’t even know where to start. Thanks for the donation. Sorry my friend swiped your jewelry all those years ago?
Vera clapped her veiny hands together. “Twenty-five thousand dollars? Looks like I’ll have my bat display after all.”
I listened to the excited chatter as everyone in the room started talking at once about the fabulous new center we’d soon have, with its computer labs and classrooms and a shiny new visitors’ center. This was very good news, and I should have been thrilled. I was thrilled. I guess. I just wished the funds hadn’t come at such a cost. My heart was on the mend, but still, I wished I’d never heard of Marian Singer Wellington or her fancy jewelry. I wished I’d never met Leo Walker. He’d disrupted my life and reminded me of all that it was missing, and he’d stolen my courage to trust someone. He was a far worse thief than Dmitri had ever been.