Secrets of a Small Town

His kind face was almost Sabrina’s undoing. But she fought the tears that hovered and managed to subvert them.

“Well…” He seemed at a loss. “You’re probably wondering why I asked you to come to the office.”

Sabrina waited.

He opened a file that lay on his desk and removed an envelope. “Your father left this letter in my safe-keeping. He asked me to give it to you should anything happen to him.”

Sabrina’s hands shook as she reached for the letter. Her heart felt as if it might burst. Her father had written her a farewell. It was so like him to know how much she would need to know he had been thinking about her and wanting to ease her grief.

She didn’t open the letter in Leland’s office. Instead, she headed for the park, thinking that would be a fitting place to read her father’s final message to her. Even after arriving and settling on their favorite bench next to the rose garden, she didn’t open the envelope.

She looked at the seal, looked at her father’s hand-writing—the bold letters and black ink. She traced the letters with her finger, then held the envelope close to her heart for a long moment.

Then, with a tremulous smile, she put her index finger under the sealed flap and slit it open.

Chapter Two

The letter was dated November, two years earlier.

Dearest Sabrina, she read.

Her father went on to say how much he loved her and how sorry he was to cause her pain, but there was something important she needed to know.

This is hard for me to write, and I know it will be painful for you to read. There’s no easy way to say it, so I’ll just say it. Six years ago I fell in love with a woman I met while conducting a tour in Italy.

I couldn’t seem to help myself. I knew she would never keep seeing me if she knew I was married, so I pretended I wasn’t. I told her I had been, but I was divorced. I told her my name was Ben Arthur. She had no idea I owned the tour company. I told her I was a consultant who worked for a dozen different companies, both in the U.S. and abroad.

After we’d been seeing each other for almost a year and she began to press for a permanent commitment, I tried, but I couldn’t give her up, so we were married in Las Vegas and honeymooned in Italy.

Sabrina gasped.

Married!

He couldn’t mean that. Her father was already married to her mother. How could he marry someone else?

She and I have had two children together. Sabrina, I know how this must shock and hurt you, but please believe me when I say that what I feel for Glynnis and our children takes nothing away from what I feel for you. You are my first and will always be the beloved child of my heart. But I love little Michael and Olivia, too, and I know you will love them as much as I do after you get to know them. As I write this, Michael is three and a half, and Olivia is just a month old.

If you are reading this, I am dead, and there will be no one else to take care of some things that must be taken care of. I could have asked Leland to do them for me, but it’s going to be painful enough for Glynnis to discover not only that she’s a widow but the truth about our marriage, so I was hoping you could find it in your heart to go and see her and tell her everything in person.

Sabrina read the letter three times before it really sank in. Her father was a bigamist. The man she’d admired and respected and thought so honest and upright and loyal and straight was a liar. He had betrayed her mother and her and everyone they knew.

How had he gotten away with this for so long? How had he managed to keep each family a secret from each other as well as everyone else? In this day and age, with cell phones and e-mail and the Internet, how had he continued to keep his two lives separate?

She stared into space for a long time. It was only when a squirrel scampered across the path, startling the pigeons that were scavenging for food, that she was jerked out of her painful thoughts and she once more picked up the letter to finish reading it.

The letter ended with contact information for both Glynnis and her twin brother Gregg. Sabrina was startled to see that they lived only a couple of hours away, just north of Columbus. Somehow she’d envisioned her father’s second life as taking place far from Rockwell.

Maybe you would prefer going to Gregg and telling him the truth and letting him break the news to Glynnis. Yes, this might be the best way.

Sabrina, please tell your mother that I am sorry about the scandal this will cause. I know how much her position in the town and her social circle matters to her.

Dear heaven, Sabrina thought. Even worse than confronting her father’s other family would be breaking this news to her mother, for Sabrina had no illusions about Isabel’s reaction. Her mother might not have loved her father the way Sabrina did, but she cared very much about her reputation. In fact, her standing in the town was probably the most important thing in her life. She would be devastated.

I am so sorry for the hurt I know you are feeling. Hurting you is the last thing I ever wanted to happen.

Although all Sabrina wanted to do was tear up the letter and put the whole nasty business out of her mind, she knew she couldn’t do that. Those two small children—her half brother and half sister—were blameless in this affair. And now that she was over the initial shock, she had to admit, she was curious. What kind of woman was this Glynnis? Young and sexy, Sabrina imagined in disgust. Probably a curvy blonde with a Marilyn Monroe voice.

Daddy, how could you do this to us?

The pain she’d tried to quell hit her then, so swift and hard it was like a kick in the stomach. Her father said he loved her, but if he’d really loved her, he could not have done this awful thing. Marrying this, this Glynnis person, was a betrayal of everything he’d stood for.

Blindly she shoved the envelope into her handbag and stood. As she started on the path leading to the parking lot and her car, clouds moved across the sun, plunging the afternoon into darkness.

A darkness that was echoed in her heart.

Sabrina drove straight back to Leland Fox’s office. She could see by the expression on his face that he had known the contents of the letter.

“How long have you known?” she asked.

“About six months.”

Sabrina couldn’t imagine why he had kept her father’s secret. Leland and Isabel had grown up together. He had always been more her friend than Ben’s. You’d think he’d have felt more loyalty toward her. She glared at him. But as quickly as her anger had come, it disappeared. None of this was Leland’s fault.

“What are you going to do?” he asked. His eyes were kind.

“I guess I have no choice. I’ll have to go see this woman and tell her about Dad’s death.”

He nodded sympathetically. “When you return, I’ll help you break the news to your mother.”

“You think I should wait before telling her?”

“There’s no hurry, is there?”

Sabrina looked down at her lap. Leland was right. There was no hurry. Nothing would change whether she told her mother today or two weeks from now. In fact, it would be easier to wait until her mother was feeling stronger and over the shock of her father’s death. She looked up, meeting Leland’s eyes. “No, there’s no hurry. And I’d be grateful for your help when I tell my mother.”

Because she needed some time before facing her mother, Sabrina stopped at the office of The Rockwell Record on the way home.

Johnny Fiore, the sports editor who also handled school news and obituaries, looked up from his desk as she entered the newsroom. “Sabrina, how are you?” He stood up to give her a hug.

“I’m okay.”

“We didn’t expect you back till next week.”

“I’m not here to work. I just stopped in to see how everything’s going.”

“She thinks we can’t do without her,” Kelsey Finnegan, the lifestyle/society/entertainment editor said, grinning at Sabrina.

“We can’t. Things are falling apart without you here.” This came from Vicki Barrows, the office manager/bookkeeper.

Sabrina smiled. She knew they were trying to lift her spirits, and for a moment, they had. “I just want to take a look at my calendar, then I’ve got to go, but I’ll be here on Monday.”

As she sat at her desk surrounded by familiar things, she felt herself growing calmer. Because she’d said she was going to, she checked her calendar and saw that she’d set up an appointment with one of their suppliers for the next morning. She buzzed for Vicki. “You’ll have to cancel tomorrow’s appointment with Jake Evans. Tell him I’ll call him to reschedule next week.”

“Will do. Anything else?”

“Maybe you could ask Bert to cover the city council meeting.” The Rockwell political scene was an area Sabrina had refused to give up, even as managerial responsibilities had pushed aside all other reporting duties.

“Sure thing.”

“How’s the ad count look?” Like most newspapers, advertising revenue dictated The Record’s size and provided most of its operating funds.

“As of the same date last year, we’re up twenty-two percent.”

Sabrina felt a surge of pride. They were having a banner year, due in large part to the hard work of Jan Kellogg, the new advertising manager Sabrina had hired in March.

Once all work-related details were taken care of, Sabrina logged on to the Internet and researched the town of Ivy, where Gregg Antonelli and his sister lived, and was pleased to discover a well-known chain motel located nearby. After making a reservation for the following night, Sabrina left the office and headed home.

On the way, all her worries came flooding back. How was she going to get through the rest of the day and all the ones to follow without raising her mother’s suspicions? Although, since her accident, Sabrina’s mother had been pretty self-involved, she was still fairly astute when it came to Sabrina and her emotions.

It was even harder than Sabrina had imagined to spend the afternoon and evening in her mother’s company without giving away her state of turmoil, but somehow she managed. She and her mother and aunt had lunch together, then Irene suggested Isabel might like to take a nap. “I know I would,” her aunt said.

To Sabrina’s relief, her mother agreed. While her mother and aunt rested, Sabrina kept her thoughts under control by spending the afternoon at the piano. Music had always been her escape, and today was no exception. She played all her old favorites—Chopin, Beethoven, Bach, Schubert, with a sprinkling of Scott Joplin thrown in.

That night, Sabrina was extremely grateful for her aunt’s presence at dinner. Irene kept the conversational ball rolling, something Sabrina knew she would not have been able to do if Irene hadn’t been there.

Toward the end of the meal, Sabrina said as casually as she could, “Mom, tomorrow I have to go to Columbus to research a story.”

Isabel stared at her. “So soon? Can’t someone else do it?”

“No, I’m afraid not. This man…he’s a whistle blower…” Oh, God, she hated lying. “And he only agreed to talk to me. It’s really important or I wouldn’t go. But you’ll be okay. Aunt Irene and Florence are both here. And I’ll only be gone one day.”

Her mother looked as if she wanted to protest some more, but Irene forestalled her by saying, “It’ll be good for Sabrina to get away, Isabel. And it’ll give us a chance to go through Ben’s clothes. You did say you wanted me to help you do that before I leave.”

Isabel nodded reluctantly.

Sabrina smiled at her aunt, who reached over and patted her hand.

The following morning, Sabrina was on her way by eight. By eleven, she was pulling her Expedition into the parking lot of the motel. Luckily they had a room ready for her. After unpacking her few things, Sabrina sat on the side of the bed and reached for the phone. Her father’s contact information for Gregg Antonelli was at his place of business—an Italian restaurant that he owned. Taking a deep breath, Sabrina punched in the numbers.

Gregg Antonelli told himself not to lose his temper, but there were times when Joe Ruggerio, his chef, tried Gregg’s patience to the point where he’d like nothing better than to tell Joe to take a hike. Joe was the best chef Gregg had ever had, yet sometimes the problems he created simply didn’t seem worth the benefits. Today was one of those days.

Gregg counted to ten. “Look, Joe, this has got to stop. Billy’s a hard worker. I don’t want to lose him.”

The expression on Joe’s florid face could only be described as a smirk.

Gregg’s jaw hardened. “I mean it. I want you to give me your word you’ll quit riding him.”

“Hey, if he can’t take the heat, he should get out of the kitchen!” Enamored of his own joke, Joe grinned and winked at Pedro, their dishwasher and Joe’s lackey.

Gregg was about to say something he’d probably regret when Lisa, the head of the wait staff, entered the kitchen.

“Gregg, phone call for you,” she said.

Saved by the bell, he thought, for if he’d given vent to his feelings, he wouldn’t have had to fire Joe. The temperamental chef would have walked out. That was the crux of the problem. Great chefs were difficult to find, especially when you couldn’t afford to pay top dollar, and Joe knew it.

Suppressing a tired sigh, Gregg headed for his minuscule office and punched the blinking line. “Gregg Antonelli.”

“Um, yes. Mr. Antonelli?”

Gregg didn’t recognize the female voice. “Yes,” he said patiently. “This is Gregg Antonelli. How can I help you, ma’am?”

“Mr. Antonelli, my name is Sabrina March.”

Gregg waited. The name meant nothing to him.

“I’m a, um, relative of Ben Arthur, who gave me your name. I know you don’t know me, but it’s very important that I talk to you about some urgent business. I’m only here in town for one day and was hoping we could meet this afternoon or evening.”

Gregg frowned. He hadn’t been aware that his sister’s husband had any relatives. In fact, if he remembered correctly, Ben had specifically said he had no close family to speak of. So who the hell was this woman and what could she possibly want?

“If Ben gave you my name and this number, then you know I own a restaurant. I’ll be tied up until at least ten-thirty tonight. But if you don’t mind coming here, say, between eight-thirty and nine, I could meet with you then. That’s when business begins to slow down, and if you like, we could have a late dinner together while we talk.”

“Thank you. That sounds fine. Could you give me directions from the Comfort Inn?”

After they’d hung up, Gregg sat at his desk for a long moment. This woman must be on the up-and-up. How else would she know about him and his relationship to Glynnis? But what possible business could she have? Gregg wished he could talk to Ben before meeting with her, but Ben was away on one of his numerous trips and wasn’t due back for another three days. Gregg supposed he could try to raise Ben on his cell phone. Quickly he looked up the number and called it, but all it yielded was Ben’s voice mail.

“Hey, Ben, this is Gregg. If you get this message before eight tonight, give me a call. It’s important.”

Gregg wondered if he should call Glynnis next and see if she had any clue as to who this woman could be, but for some reason, he hesitated to do so. For one thing, his sister was a worrier. For another, his niece was suffering with an ear infection and Glynnis hadn’t been getting a whole lot of sleep the past few days. For all he knew, she was napping along with the kids.

It was always tough on her when Ben was traveling, which was most of the time. Gregg’s frown deepened. He had not been happy when Glynnis married Ben. Even if the man hadn’t been nearly twenty years older than his sister, his frequent absences and his tendency to want to keep Glynnis to himself would have been enough to turn Gregg off. He’d always believed his sister could have done much better, but ever since she’d married Ben she’d seemed happy, so Gregg had kept his opinions to himself. He remembered only too well what had happened the last time he’d meddled in her love life.

Throughout the day, Gregg found himself thinking of the upcoming meeting whenever there was any kind of break in the action. Not that there were many. Antonelli’s had always been popular with the lunch crowd, but for the past year—ever since a big computer software company had relocated its offices in the office complex a half mile down the road—they’d had a packed house every weekday.

When it finally slowed around two in the afternoon, the kitchen staff had all they could do to prepare for the evening meal, which started as early as five. In the afternoons, Gregg usually helped out in the kitchen because it wasn’t only good chefs that were hard to come by. It was hard to find good help, period.

Today he worked on the salad line, cutting carrots and onions, which Maggie, the sous-chef, added to the torn pieces of romaine lettuce she’d arranged on the salad plates. They usually tried to plate at least fifty salads for the evening. Anything left over could be used at lunch the next day. A couple of sliced tomatoes would be added to the salads just before serving, because they did best if they weren’t cut beforehand. There was nothing Gregg hated more than cold, mushy tomatoes on a salad.

In fact, he wouldn’t tolerate that kind of sloppiness in his restaurant. He took pride in the fact that at Antonelli’s they used the best and freshest possible ingredients available and that their salads had been given a high rating from the food editor of the local newspaper.

People who knew nothing about the restaurant business thought it was glamorous. Gregg himself had thought the same thing before he’d actually worked in one. There was nothing glamorous about it at all. It was extremely hard work, and half the startups didn’t survive. Antonelli’s had had a couple of rough years—years in which Gregg wasn’t sure he’d make it, either—but a combination of hard work, informed planning, consistently good food, and luck had pulled him through.

Now Antonelli’s was thriving.

But its success had come at a personal cost to Gregg. As always, when his thoughts turned to Lynn, his former fiancée, he felt a twinge of regret. They’d dated a couple of years and had been engaged another eighteen months before she’d called it quits a year ago. She’d said she could deal with a rival if the rival was female, but there was no way she was going to spend the rest of her life competing with a restaurant for his time and attention.

Gregg hadn’t tried to change her mind. He’d loved Lynn, yes, but not enough to give up the business he’d worked so hard to build.

Not enough. Those were the key words, he guessed. At least that’s what Glynnis had said.

“Hey, boss, you gonna work or you gonna daydream?” Maggie said, poking him.

Gregg blinked, then grinned. “Sorry.” He began to stack the salads on racks that would slide into one of the big refrigerators.

After that, the day passed quickly. So quickly that before Gregg knew it, it was eight o’clock. He alerted Janine, their evening hostess, that he was expecting a guest and asked her to buzz him in his office when the March woman arrived.

On the dot of eight-thirty, Janine said his visitor was there.

Too curious to wait, Gregg abandoned the supply order he’d been working on and walked out front. He saw the woman immediately. Janine had seated her in one of the alcoves, as Gregg had requested. The woman hadn’t seen him yet; she was looking out the window, so he had a chance to study her for a few moments.

She was pretty and younger than she’d sounded on the phone—probably in her middle twenties. She wore her dark, chin-length hair swept back from her face and caught up in the back with some kind of silver clip. She was dressed simply, in black slacks and a wine-colored sweater. A black leather jacket was draped across the back of her chair.

As he got closer, she turned, and their eyes met. Hers were large and gray—beautiful eyes, he thought—and filled with an emotion he couldn’t identify. He frowned. What was it? Concern? Uncertainty? Fear? Whatever it was, it only reinforced his own uneasiness over the reason for her appearance in Ivy.

“Miss March? I’m Gregg Antonelli.” He held out his hand, and she took it. Her hand felt cool, and her handshake was firm.

“Hi. Thank you for seeing me on such short notice.”

He liked her voice. It was much softer than it had seemed on the phone. Gregg sat down across from her and beckoned to Chris, who waited on this section. “Would you like a glass of wine?”

“I don’t think so, thank you.”

“What about dinner? You were still planning to eat with me?”

“Yes, I’d love to.” She looked around. “This is a very nice restaurant.”

“Thanks. We’ve done well.”

Picking up the menu, she studied it for a moment, then said, “What do you recommend?”

“Depends what you like. Pasta? Chicken? Veal?”

She put the menu down and for the first time, she smiled. “I’m a pasta person.”

“Then I recommend the combination ravioli and tortellini. That’s our specialty. My personal preference is the marinara sauce, but we do offer it with a cheese sauce, if you’d prefer that.”

“That sounds good. With the marinara sauce.”

Gregg turned to Chris. “We’ll both have the ravioli and tortellini, and I’ll have a glass of the house Chianti. And the lady will have…?”

“Iced tea, please.”

Within moments Chris had brought them a basket of warm focaccia bread and a plate of seasoned olive oil for dipping, followed by their drinks. All the while he was serving them, Gregg studied Sabrina March. She was a small woman, with narrow wrists and slender arms. He’d bet, standing, she wouldn’t reach five feet four inches. She had a small, heart-shaped face which, along with those expressive gray eyes, made her seem vulnerable, yet her voice and mannerisms and the way she met his gaze squarely suggested self-confidence. It was an intriguing mix that he found especially attractive.

When Chris left them to get their salads, Gregg said, “Tell me, Miss March, just how are you related to Ben?”

She reached for a piece of bread, hesitated, then said, “I’d rather explain why I’m here first.”

Gregg tensed at the evasive answer, certain now that he wasn’t going to like what she had to say.

“First of all, please call me Sabrina.”

“All right, if you’ll call me Gregg.”

She put down her piece of bread. Leaning forward, she fixed those big eyes on him. “I just want you to know that I hate having to bring you this kind of news.”

“What news?”

She spoke slowly. “The man you know as Ben Arthur is dead. He died last Thursday.”

“What?” Gregg stared at her. “That can’t be true.”

“I’m sorry. I’m afraid it is true.”

“And just what do you mean by the man you know as Ben Arthur?”

“His…his name is really Ben March. Benjamin Arthur March.”

“Look, I don’t know what you’re trying to pull—”

“I’m not trying to pull anything,” she cried. “I’m telling you the truth.”

She reached for her handbag and pulled out a wallet. Removing two laminated cards, she handed them to him. They were both Ohio driver’s licenses. Her picture was on the first card. Sabrina Isabel March. An address in Rockwell, Ohio. And Ben’s picture was on the second. Benjamin Arthur March. With another Rockwell address.

Gregg felt as if someone had kicked him in the stomach. What the hell was going on here?

“Mr. Antonelli…Gregg,” she continued softly, “I’m so sorry.” She sighed deeply. “You asked me how I’m related to…Ben. Ben March is…was…my father.”

“Your father,” he said dully.

“Yes.”

“But—”

“I know, he never said anything about having a daughter. Obviously, there were a lot of things he didn’t tell you.”

Gregg didn’t know what to think. “I don’t understand. Why didn’t he tell us about you? I mean, he told my sister he was divorced. And why use a different name? It doesn’t make any sense.”