Folly Beach - Dorothea Benton Frank [43]
“All right then. I want you to tell me how someone as smart as you are got completely bamboozled by that son of a bitch Addison Cooper. And Lord love a duck, I probably shouldn’t say this, but Ella and I never liked him one damn bit. I mean, look, I understand a little bimbo on the side. It’s not nice, but I get it. I even understand a love child—it happens. And I get the chasing skirts in the office. Men can be very stupid about their you-know-whats. They all think they’re made out of gold!”
“Boy, that’s for sure.”
“Amen. And nobody understands how a business can fail any better than I do. I’ve been to the edge and back one hundred times. But here’s what I don’t get. Tell me how he leveraged your whole life, your house, your furniture, your everything down to your lightbulbs . . . tell me, number one, how he got that one by you and number two, why weren’t you even suspicious?”
Wow, I thought, wow. Like I had not thought this through for almost every waking minute since I found his body? She must have thought I was the biggest idiot to ever draw a breath. Suddenly I didn’t want to talk about it.
“Eggs might be good for me. You know, protein?”
“Well, as I said, Cate, it’s none of my business. I know that.”
I didn’t know how to respond, so I just said, “You know what, Aunt Daisy? I don’t know the answers to your questions. That’s one of the reasons I came here, to try to figure that all out. I mean, you’re right, it’s bad enough to lose everything, including your husband, his reputation, which used to be something else entirely, stellar, in fact, and then to realize all of it was going on right under your own nose. And as far as borrowing money against the house, he must have forged my signature.”
“My word! The skunk!”
“Exactly. That’s all I can imagine, because Mark said the banks would’ve required two signatures. But who knows how elaborate his shenanigans were? How deep does that river of deception run? I learned about it all in a seventy-two-hour tidal wave until there wasn’t a glass left in the house to fill up with liquor to chug or a bar stool to fall off of if I did. It doesn’t really matter how he got away with everything, does it? It doesn’t matter anymore, because it’s a fait accompli. But I’m still a little shell-shocked, to tell you the truth. Yeah. I’m shell-shocked.”
Aunt Daisy looked at me for what seemed like forever, planning her response. At first, she had been angry for me and even with me but now she saw me as I was. Damaged. Floundering.
“Truth,” she finally said. “Do you want to know the truth?”
“Right now? No. I don’t. Somewhere between Charlotte, North Carolina, and the outskirts of Charleston I decided that maybe the best thing for me would be to get into some heavy denial and tell myself this isn’t my fault. Otherwise, I think I might crack into a million little pieces.”
Aunt Daisy looked at me again with watery eyes, their once-blue color faded from age to a soft dove-gray. She leaned forward, taking my hand in hers. “It’s not your fault.”
I thought I would break down then. “You really don’t think it was?”
“I do not think it was your fault. Any of it. And if you had your suspicions about things, and I’m sure you did from time to time, it would be only natural to sweep them under a rug.”
“You know, I’m sure Patti told you, he was really changed.”
“Stress. Stress does that to people. Why, he, he . . . he took his own life, Cate. He must have been completely, completely defeated.”
“He didn’t know how to lose, Aunt Daisy.”
“Loss is a bitter pill. A bitter pill.”
“Especially for someone like Addison. He was a very proud man. Don’t you know he probably went through every possible scenario he could think of to save himself and our house?”
“Of course he did.” She patted my hand and I looked down at hers. Aunt Daisy’s knuckles were swollen and arthritic and probably ached all the time. After a moment or two she stood up and rubbed her hands together briskly to warm them. “Come on, now. Let’s get some breakfast into you and get this day moving. Ella will tan our hides with