Chapter Ten

A Shiny Plane

Claire gathered her things from the room when the Hamiltons’ car pulled in the driveway. She looked at Colin, who held her suitcase. His jaw clenched when he heard his dad yell they were there.

“You can walk with me to the guesthouse if you’d like. Frieda and I decided to go there and stay, and let Emily have her own room, instead of sharing yours.” She raised an eyebrow and waited for him to reply.

“I agree. And thank you. I know what an ordeal this is. I wish I was going with you.”

She didn’t doubt this situation his father had put him in was quite a predicament for him. Never before had she relished the thought of being an only child with one parent. Too many members meant problems, it seemed. She pulled the overnight case from the bed and walked out with him. They were stopped by his dad at the end of the stairs.

“Colin, put that down and go out and greet our guests.” He took the broken-handled suitcase from his son. He stared at his hand after setting it down on the ground.

“Dad, I’m helping Claire. I’ll be back in a minute.” He reached down to pick up the case.

His dad leaned and whispered something in Colin’s ear.

“Fine.” He set the case back down and looked up at Claire. “This will only take a minute. I’ll be right back.”

Her chest tightened. She had about all she could take with Mr. Prescott and his bullying ways. “I’ll take it myself. I’m not an invalid.”

She snapped up the case, almost breaking off the handle entirely, and rushed past them.

“Claire,” Colin called out as she stormed through the kitchen.

She didn’t turn back. So far, he was failing at the stand-up-to-Dad plan.

She stood behind a tree and watched Colin greet the Hamiltons. Mr. Hamilton looked to be a spindly man. His belt could’ve easily wrapped twice around his waistline. The parrot-shaped nose on his face sat between two small eyes. Eyeglasses might’ve help take the beadiness out of them. He wore a golf hat that was plaid and a wild pair of pants. He seemed to enjoy shaking everyone’s hand. Mallory rubbed hers after the big squeeze.

Mrs. Hamilton was equally as tall as her husband. A gaunt-looking woman. Perhaps no one cooked in the family, or perhaps they just spent all their free time jogging miles up and down their pear-tree lined driveway. Her face was powder-white, with a pointy nose. She chose to wear long sleeves, no matter that the temperature was soaring in the mid-nineties that day.

Emily was shorter than both of them, her hair shoulder length and dark brown. Her nose was perky and her cheeks rosy. She wore khaki-colored Capri pants and a polo shirt with cute slip-on shoes. Someone Claire could see Colin dating, for sure. Which made her wonder why he was with her. Claire always saw herself as tall and lanky, with size eight feet and still sporting a boob size in the As. This Emily girl was packaged more to his match. A B-cup chick for sure, maybe even size six for shoes—Claire couldn’t tell from the distance she stood from them.

She watched as Colin shook Mr. and Mrs. Hamilton’s hands. Emily leaned in for a hug, but he kept her at arm’s length with a firm shoulder grip. Good boy. Satisfied with Colin’s body language, Claire continued on her way to the guesthouse. The sandy trail meandered through a set of tall pines that kept a natural border between both dwellings.

She opened the unlocked door and made her way to the bedrooms upstairs, settling on the first one she came to. The full-size mattress sat tall and was bordered by a painted white iron bed frame. It was the one she and Colin made love on. She saw how the pillows were still twisted under the pale-pink comforter. She set down her bags by the window, startled at first by the creaky floor in front of the closet door. All she could see was a view of the trees. She knew the beach wasn’t far behind them.

After she settled her things in, she strolled back to the house. She figured Mr. Prescott would win at this game if she chose to run away and hide. So she did the opposite and showed up for the challenge. Something had gotten into her since coming on this strange vacation. Colin made her want to put up a fight…be someone she wasn’t used to being.

She found everyone in the living room, sitting formally on the stiff brocade sofas and winged backed chairs. The only time she remembered coming into this room was to play tea party with Mallory when they were younger. They’d raise their pinkies and sip imaginary Earl Grey, discussing how their pretend children were driving them crazy.

“Colin, I don’t know how you could want to pilot one of those deathtraps. Me and the missus don’t care for flying. Get me on a boat or train any day. Those I can feel the land right under my feet.” His accent oozed a Southern drawl.

Mr. Prescott offered Mr. Hamilton a cigar from his box, stashed in the drawer of a side table. Mr. Hamilton shook his head no. “I don’t know why either. I hate planes, myself.”

“Then why did you tell me to put a bid on that airstrip in North Carolina, James?”

Colin pulled himself to the edge of the chair. “What airstrip, Dad?”

Mr. Prescott sat back down and leaned back in his burgundy striped chair. He set the box of cigars on his lap. “Well, son, it was going to be a surprise, but I guess the cat’s out of the bag. I’m buying you one of those godforsaken two-seater, twin engine planes for your graduation present. May God be with you when you fly it. ’Cause I know for damn sure I won’t be.”

Mr. Prescott wasn’t a stupid man, regardless of what people thought about his personality. He knew Colin wasn’t settled on returning to America to run the company. He’d detected it that past Christmas when they visited him in London. He’d already began asking if his vice president was still at the company. Colin was hinting in a change of plans for him, maybe venturing into another field. Mr. Prescott knew strategically the best way to corral a wild horse was to build a fence when he wasn’t looking. All it took was a plane to keep Colin’s focus off his father locking the gate.

Claire nearly slipped off the threshold at the entrance of the room. Mr. Prescott was pulling out the stops to control his son. What would he think of next? To bring back Amelia Earhart from the dead to instruct him how to fly it?

“Dad, are you serious? A plane? And my very own airstrip?” He nearly leapt from the seat of his chair, right into his dad’s master web.

Emily watched him with nervousness as she straightened her posture and began biting at her bottom lip. “Colin, when I heard what Dad was cooking up, I nearly died. Planes are so dangerous. I wouldn’t want anything to happen to you.”

“Oh, great sakes, Emily. They don’t let someone just take a plane out for a test drive. They’ll give him proper training.” Her father situated his binding belt and readjusted on the chair. “Now that doesn’t mean when he does get a license that I want you sharing a seat in the cockpit, honey. You just leave that hobby to Colin.”

Had Colin gone ignorant? He just sat there, smiling deliriously. Completely blind to his father’s feeble, albeit, master plan to keep his thumb on Colin. Is that all it took to make him forget his plan with Claire? A shiny plane and a stretch of land to take off from? Hello? The skinny guy said it’s in North Carolina! That’s states away from New York. Not to mention in the backyard of Emily Hamilton’s place of residence. Remember her? The psycho date from London? How could Claire compete with this new shiny nickel?

“Well, son,” Mr. Prescott said, full of self-accomplishment—even patting himself on the belly. “The airstrip is still up in the air. Mr. Hamilton put in my bid, but I’m still waiting to hear on it.”

Claire noticed Melanie on the chair by the back windows and wondered what her take was on this. She was all but covered with long stretches of vines from the plants Frieda collected and had displayed on the table next to her. There was a serene look on her face. A steady smile sat prominently on her face, where usually there was none. “I think it’s great, son.”

“All I got for my graduation was a trip to Paris,” Mallory interjected.

“Now, dear. That is a two-week stay in the Peninsula Paris. Your veranda stares out at the Eiffel Tower. Not to mention the two-carat diamond earrings we gave you on graduation day.” Her mother crooked her head, trying to see her daughter’s face.

“I know, Mom. And I loved them and the trip. I’m checking my schedule to see when I can go. But an airplane? I saw Colin’s grades. He shouldn’t get an airplane for what he got. Maybe a toy remote one, if any.”

No one paid any attention to Mallory’s pout of sisterly disparagement. They were mumbling back and forth about Paris and the fear of flying.

“That’s so amazing,” Colin muttered underneath his breath. It was as though he hadn’t heard anything other than the words airplane and airstrip in the last ten minutes. He had this kind of dazed look on his face, with glassy eyes and a directionless stare.

“Well, enough about airplanes.” Mr. Prescott stood. “I’m having a boat delivered to the pier right about now.” He checked his watch.

“You don’t say, James?” Mr. Hamilton patted his taut stomach. “I love boats. What kind is it?”

“I’m not sure what it is. I told the man I wanted the best he had at the marina. I’m going to tour you around the island. Show you the golf course they have over on Mission Point. You can tell me if it’s anything like the one you have back home in North Carolina.”

Emily grabbed Colin’s arm as he got up from his chair, and laced hers with it.

Claire waited to see what he’d do. Before she could beam him with a set of her angry eyes, Mr. Prescott yelled for Claire to bring some wine and glasses for the trip. What did she look like, the help? No one had even formally introduced her to this pack of wolves.

“I’ll show you where they are.” Mallory pulled Claire into the kitchen.

“What’s up with you?” she asked, after she gave Claire back her arm when they got in there.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Claire had to hurry and get down to the boat and remind Colin of his mission. Now that he’d gotten the green light for flying the plane, he’d add Claire to the wish list and it was either all or nothing. Simple as that. It’s what they rehearsed in that little cottage on Mission Point. She could still smell his chest and remember how it felt as she ran her fingers over it now when she closed her eyes.

“I saw how you were looking at Colin and Emily. Granted, the girl is a bit over-the-top pretentious; did you see her Fendi handbag actually matched her shoes? And that scarf. Who wears a scarf with a polo? I saw it in a magazine last week and retail on it was four hundred dollars. But what do you care?” Whoever said Mallory Prescott didn’t know fashion was ill-informed. She knew more than Vogue magazine.

Claire pulled her to the side, and looked first to make sure the jolly boaters were out of the house. “Mallory, Colin and I have been kind of seeing each other.” She licked her lips and hesitated to admit the big one. “It’s getting kind of serious.”

Mallory squealed. She fanned her hands and jumped up and down. “I knew it. I told Mom I suspected something was up with you two. Oh my gosh, oh my gosh. And that day you two disappeared. I saw how you looked at him after it. Oh my gosh!” She sounded like a tween who’d just heard her favorite boy band was coming to town for a concert… and she had backstage passes to see them.

“Oh crap. You told your mother?” It hit Claire like a five-story building, toppling over her all at once. “What did she say? Did she tell Mr. Prescott?” That might be the reasoning behind the plane and miniature airport. She knew he wasn’t as much of a philanthropist as he’d bragged himself up to be to the Hamiltons.

“She told me to mind my own business and that it wasn’t true.” She came off her boy band crush giddiness and said it in a mocking tone of her mother’s voice. But then she got giddy again. Hormones. “Do you know what this means?” She grabbed her by the arms. “This means we’ll be sisters. That is, if you two decide to get married. I mean, if it gets to that point. He seems so different now. I thought it was just that I hadn’t seen him in a while, but maybe it’s you.” She jumped up and down. “And we can have our children play together. Jason is going to be so stoked. He likes you a lot, Claire. And you’re beaming. It’s written all over you that this is something good. Oh, I’m so happy for the two of you.” She went to grab her for a hug.

“Hold on, Mallory.” Claire pulled away. She enjoyed her enthusiasm, but she had to extract Colin from the Prescott web first. “Your dad brought Emily here to throw a wrench in it. He wants them to ride off into the sunset so he can get some waterfront property and retire.”

“Well then, let’s just go and get little Miss Fendi and throw her from the boat.”

Claire laughed and waited as Mallory took two bottles of wine from the cabinet. Claire carried the basket of long stem wine glasses and they began their way to the boat.