Gilt by Association by Karen Rose Smith Read Free Book Online Page A

little while to sell ours in spite of the open house. I don’t want you worrying about it.”
    â€œYou’ve always taken care of me,” Louise said to her husband.
    In some ways, Louise and Chet reminded Caprice of her own parents. They’d been married a long time. They were a team. They seemed to navigate the marital waters without dissension. Her own parents argued sometimes and those arguments could get very loud. But they always made up. Louise and Chet, however, didn’t seem as connected as her own parents did. Could that be because they didn’t have children?
    There was suddenly a noise that came from the phone in the holster on Chet’s belt. It was a vibration as if he had the ring tone turned off.
    â€œI’m expecting an important text about negotiations. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll go outside and take care of it.”
    He stepped outside the door into the hall.
    Louise said, “I know selling the business isn’t easy for him. The negotiations are difficult, too. His lawyer has been on the phone with him often the past few days. Sometimes I’m not so sure he does want to sell. Retirement can be difficult for some men.”
    â€œHe has his hobbies.”
    â€œGolf and skiing, and you know I hate skiing.”
    Louise disliked cold weather because it could often stir up that arrhythmia. So she never went skiing with her husband.
    â€œSoon spring will be here and you can play golf together.”
    â€œOr maybe, better yet, we can be staying in a villa in Tuscany. Now that’s some place I’d like to go.”
    â€œAnd Chet?”
    â€œI think he’d prefer London or Paris, but I’m hoping with all the time in the world in front of us, we can compromise.”
    The bottom line was, that’s how folks stayed married for thirty years. Lots of compromise.
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    As Caprice climbed out of her yellow restored Camaro that she parked in the Downings’ driveway on Friday, she saw the greenhouse door was open and raised voices were spewing from inside.
    â€œI do not want to have that kind of mortgage on the next property,” Chet announced, in a louder than usual voice, as if this argument had been going on for a while.
    â€œWe don’t have to have any mortgage,” Louise countered. “Let’s just buy it outright.”
    â€œIt’s not an investment that way.” He sounded as if he were talking to a child and trying to explain the basics.
    This was the day before the open house and Caprice didn’t know whether to walk into the middle of this argument or head in another direction. She remembered what Chet had said about Rachel when Louise was in the hospital. Maybe we shouldn’t take Rachel with us. Was he trying to cut expenses, as well as downsize so they could travel more? Or was he cutting expenses for another reason?
    Suddenly Caprice didn’t have to make the decision whether to step into the greenhouse or stroll up the walk to the house because Chet said, “There’s just no talking to you sometimes,” and left the greenhouse with purposeful strides.
    When he saw Caprice, he did a one-eighty and smiled. “Good to see you, Caprice. I hope you draw in a lot of buyers. I’m ready to sell.”
    Then he used his vehicle remote, climbed into his SUV, and started the engine.
    Her sixties-style fringed purse on her arm with its large dangling peace sign charm, her boots brushing against her ankles, she went to the greenhouse and stood in the doorway. The glass enclosure was humid, warm, and bright with artificial light as well as sunlight. Louise was sitting on a stool at her potting bench, looking dejected, rearranging seed packets on the back shelf. She simply appeared to be going through the motions.
    She didn’t hear Caprice until Caprice said, “Hi, there.”
    When Louise turned around, she looked teary-eyed. Then she straightened her shoulders and said in an