Page 19 of Return to Rosewood Beach

She was just picking up the box, about to take it out to her car, when she heard a knock on her front door.

Curious, she set the box down and went to open the door. People didn’t knock on her door without warning hardly ever anymore. That was something that had been common before cell phones, but now even her neighbors usually sent her some sort of message before dropping by.

She opened the door and her eyebrows lifted in surprise when she saw Julia standing there. Her daughter looked tired, and clearly upset about something. Julia’s face, normally decked out in an elaborate makeup job, was pale and there were dark circles under her eyes, as if she hadn’t gotten much sleep.

“Julia!” Vivian reached out to give her daughter a hug. “Is everything all right?”

Julia took a deep breath and said, “Can we go sit down and talk for a little while?”

Vivian knew in that moment that everything was not all right, and her heart sank.

“Yes, of course.” She smiled bravely at her daughter, even though her bloodstream had started to rush faster with nervousness. “Come on and sit down in the living room with me.”

Julia stepped inside and they made their way into the cozy, tidy living room. Vivian watched Julia’s eyes sweep around the room slowly, and she guessed that her daughter was remembering all of the good times they’d had together in that room. Christmases and birthdays and family movie nights, with all of them shouting and laughing and playing games and eating good food.

She sat down on the couch and took Julia’s hands in hers as soon as her daughter sat down beside her. “Now tell me what’s troubling you.”

“Mom.” Julia looked into her mother’s eyes for a moment, and then looked down at the carpet. “There… I was going over the finances last night.”

There was a long pause, and Vivian’s heart started to pound.

“Is something wrong with the finances, honey?”

Julia looked back up into her mother’s eyes. “You don’t know, then?” she asked softly. “I was hoping that maybe you knew.”

“Knew what?” She squeezed her daughter’s hands. “Tell me, please.”

Was there something wrong with the pub’s finances? Were they in trouble somehow? If that was the case, she wasn’t sure how she could cope with it. In the middle of her grief about Frank, she’d been leaning on the fact that she got to continue running The Lighthouse Grill and carrying on the family legacy.

“I looked at the pub’s finances last night,” Julia said slowly, squeezing her mother’s hands back. “And I found some strange things.” She paused for a moment, and Vivian’s stomach lurched. She could tell from her daughter’s body language that something was very wrong. “I found that Dad had a lot of debt. That… that the pub still has a lot of debt. A lot of debt to casinos.”

Vivian’s heart stopped for a moment. She stared at her daughter, unable to believe what she was hearing. “Casinos? But—but Frank never gambled.”

The way Julia winced made it clear that Frank had gambled. And if he had debts, that would mean that he must have gambled a lot…

She took a deep breath, trying to steady herself even though her blood was rushing in her ears. “Tell me more. Are you sure he gambled?”

Julia nodded. “He did. He gambled a lot.” Her voice was soft, and she winced again, seeming to know how much the news was hurting Vivian.

“When? Just recently, or?—”

Julia shook her head. “For a long time. It looks like he’d been gambling for years.”

Vivian covered her face with her hands, unable to stop the tears from coming. She could hardly believe it, but she had to. She knew Julia was not only careful but considerate, and that she never would have come to her with that information unless she’d been absolutely sure that it was true.

“How could he have kept this from me?” she said, her voice almost a whisper. Frank had been a quiet man, but she’d always believed that he shared everything with her. He’d usually had good spirits, often whistling and making jokes when he wasn’t quietly working or thinking. She couldn’t believe that for all those years, he’d been hiding such an ugly secret from her.

“So you had no idea?” Julia asked softly, wrapping an arm around her mother. “And none of my siblings had any idea either?”

Vivian shook her head, feeling as though the ground was unstable under her feet. She felt as though her whole perception of her husband as the caretaker of her and her children had been deflated. “No idea. He—he lied to me for all those years.”

Julia held her mother tightly, almost rocking her back and forth a little. “Everyone makes mistakes. It doesn’t mean he didn’t love us. I know it hurts, but it doesn’t erase all the good things he was either.”

Vivian took a deep breath, closing her eyes and feeling comforted by her daughter’s words. “You’re right.”

“We’re all here for you, Mom. We love you. Everything’s going to turn out okay. And I will be right here with you, helping you figure all this out.”

Vivian nodded, taking a deep breath. She would stay strong for her children, and she knew they would stay strong for each other and for her. As hard a blow as the news was, she was grateful that she didn’t have to face it alone.

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