Kathie DeNosky - The Kincaids - Southern Seduction

For the next week after touring the mansion with Lily, Daniel found himself embroiled in a labor dispute with the dockworkers that left little time for anything but a few hurried phone calls and a standing order at the local florist for a daily bouquet of flowers to be delivered to her apartment. Lily hadn’t asked him to stop calling and seemed to appreciate all of the flowers, but they still weren’t completely back to where they had been with their affair before Christmas. That was the first thing he intended to remedy as soon as possible.

It would already have been taken care of by now, if not for the snag that had developed with the labor force. He had thought he and the union president had worked things out the day he had taken Lily to the aquarium, but apparently the rank and file had other ideas. Just that afternoon, he had been able to come to an agreement with the dockworkers and anticipated being able to spend a lot more time with her.

Unfortunately, tonight was not one of those times. In one of their phone conversations, Lily had explained that she would be babysitting her nephew on Thursday evenings for the next few weeks, while her brothers worked on getting reports ready for Jack Sinclair. So what was he going to do with his evening?

As he sat at his desk contemplating his options, his cell phone rang. “Daniel Addison,” he said, answering the call.

“Daniel, I’m so glad I caught you.”

“Hello, Charlotte.” At her request, he hadn’t called her “Mom” or “Mother” in years.

“I haven’t talked to you since Christmas Day and I was wondering when I may expect a visit,” she said in her usual formal tone.

“I’m free this evening,” he answered, deciding not to put her off. He did want to talk to his mother about the night of the dinner party and what she might have said to Lily. This evening seemed as good a time as any to do that.

“I think that would be marvelous, Daniel. Shall I have Cook set an extra place for dinner?” she asked.

Barely able to keep from rolling his eyes at her pretentiousness, he sighed heavily. “Sure, why not.”

“I’ll expect you at six then.” His mother ended the call as she always did, without saying goodbye.

Twenty minutes later, as he drove to the home he had grown up in on East Battery Street, just half a mile from the Beauchamp mansion, Daniel couldn’t help but think about how vastly different his childhood had been from Lily’s. She had been raised in a loving home with several brothers and sisters, who remained quite close as adults.

He, on the other hand, had been the only child of a frequently aloof mother and a father who could only be described as a dreamer. To say his parents were a mismatched couple was an understatement and Daniel couldn’t understand how they had managed to stay together for over twenty-five years of marriage.

Charlotte Beauchamp-Addison was all about maintaining her standing in society and feeling superior among her circle of so-called friends, while George Addison had drifted through life with a laid-back, “whatever will be, will be” attitude. Daniel sometimes even wondered if his father had purposely ignored the signs of an impending heart attack, in order to die and get away from the pretentiousness and snobbery of life with Charlotte.

When he parked his car, Daniel entered through the back door of the house. He had always liked coming in through the kitchen. At least he got a warm greeting from Rosemary, the housekeeper and cook who had worked for his parents for as long as he could remember. It hadn’t been easy, but he had managed to see that the woman remained on the job, even through the times when he hadn’t been sure he would be able to bring Addison Industries back to solvency. But the woman was, and always had been, considered part of the family.

“How’s my favorite girl?” Daniel asked, smiling as he walked over to where the gray-haired woman stood, stirring something in a pot on the stove.

“I’m mad at you, Daniel Addison,” she said, her attention never wavering from what she was cooking. “You haven’t been by to see me in almost three weeks. Do you know how hard it is for a woman my age not seeing the boy I helped raised? I could very well die of a broken heart.”

Daniel chuckled as he kissed the woman’s wrinkled cheek. “I’m sorry, Rosemary, but there’s been a lot going on since Christmas. Will it make you feel better if I try to do better in the future?”

She turned to give him a sympathetic look. “I heard about Miss Lily’s daddy. How is that poor child doing?”

“As well as can be expected under the circumstances,” he answered. The woman had only met Lily once, at the dinner party before the holidays, but she and Lily had hit it off right away.

“My heart goes out to that girl, losing him the way she did,” Rosemary said, her kind brown eyes shining with unshed tears. “You be sure to tell her that I’ve got her and her family in my thoughts and prayers.”

“I’ll do that,” he said, knowing the kind-hearted woman his mother insisted on calling “Cook” was completely sincere with her sympathy.

Continuing into the sitting room, he found Charlotte posed by the window, staring out at Charleston Harbor. It was her favorite place to be when receiving guests.

“I don’t know why you insist on coming in the back way like a common servant, Daniel,” she admonished, turning to face him.

“Hello to you too, Charlotte,” he said, sitting down in one of the chairs by the fireplace. “How have you been?”

His question was all it took to get his mother started on the various charity functions she was helping to plan and the latest gossip circulating through the garden club. Barely listening, something she said suddenly caught his attention.

“What was that?” he asked, sitting up straight in the chair.

“I said that Madelyn Worthington told me all about poor Elizabeth Kincaid’s betrayal by that wretched man,” Charlotte said, patting an imaginary out-of-place hair back into place. “I’ve known for years that Reginald Kincaid was nothing but a low-bred scoundrel and I’m not the least bit surprised he turned out to be such an embarrassment to his family. Having a mistress and two bastard children in Greenville is just a disgrace.”

“Only one of the woman’s sons belongs to Kincaid,” he corrected. “And when did you start feeling sorry for Elizabeth Kincaid?” He distinctly remembered Charlotte referring to the woman as being a fool for marrying beneath her station.

His mother ignored the question, asking one of her own. “Are you still keeping company with that youngest Kincaid girl?”

“As a matter of fact, I am,” he said proudly.

Charlotte looked anything but pleased. “Really? I thought the two of you had a parting of the ways just before Christmas.”

Daniel narrowed his eyes. Now he knew his mother had something to do with his and Lily’s breakup. Otherwise, how would she have known?

“We stopped seeing each other for a few weeks, but just recently started dating again.” Technically they had only gone out once since running into each other at the lawyer’s office, but he fully intended for their trip to the aquarium to be the first of many outings they shared. “Why do you ask?”

“Oh, the night of my dinner party it seemed like she was losing interest in continuing your association,” his mother said calmly.

With years of practice at being a master manipulator, he wasn’t fooled by Charlotte’s disinterested demeanor. His mother knew a lot more about why Lily tried to end their affair than he did and he intended to find out what that was.

“What did you say to her?” he asked. “And don’t tell me you don’t know what I’m talking about, Charlotte. I know exactly how you operate.”