Danielle Steel - Southern Lights

“I’ll come to visit you. I promise,” Alexa said, trying to be grown up about it. But she felt like a sad, scared kid herself, and she was so sorry for Savannah. This was the most upsetting for her, to be uprooted like that, with no notice, to go to a place she didn’t know, with a father she scarcely knew.

“You won’t come to visit,” Savannah said, sobbing. “You hate it there. You said you’d never go back there again.”

“Of course I will, silly, if you’re there. You won’t be there for long, and it might be fun. You can go to school.”

“I don’t want to miss the rest of senior year at home.” But she was rapidly figuring out that there was no arguing about it. Her parents, both of them, for the first time in ten years, had made up their minds and had made a unilateral decision. Savannah was leaving New York until after the trial, and that was it. Savannah just sat there and cried for five minutes while Alexa tried to soothe her, and then told her she’d come to the airport that afternoon to say goodbye.

“What should I pack?” Alexa asked, and Savannah started giving her instructions. She was still crying, but not quite as vehemently as she had before. “I’ll give you both of my pink sweaters,” Alexa said, smiling through her own tears.

“And the new black high heels?” Savannah was almost smiling. More than anything, she was in shock. They all were. Things were moving very fast.

“Okay, okay,” Alexa conceded about the shoes, if it would help. “You can have them too. You drive a hard bargain.”

“What if his wife hates me? I’ve never even met her. She probably won’t like having me there,” Savannah said, panicked. That sounded like a major understatement to her mother. Luisa was a bitch on wheels, and Savannah had heard her say it for years.

“Daddy will take care of it. You’re not staying forever. It’s only for three months. I’ll try to come down next week.”

“You’d better, or I’m running away and coming home.”

“Don’t you dare!” Alexa said sternly, but she knew Savannah wouldn’t do that. She had been reasonable all her life. And she was being reasonable now too, even if it was a hard situation for her. “I’d better go pack now. I’ll see you later, sweetheart.”

Tom called her ten minutes later, and said he had gotten them on a six o’clock flight that would land in Charleston at eight-thirty, and they were leaving Vermont right then. He hoped to be at JFK by four or five.

“I’ll be there at four with her bags. Call me on my cell phone when you get to the airport.” She gave him the number, which he had never had before. All he had was her e-mail, but they had to work together now. “I’ll be at the United terminal.”

“I’ll try to get there as soon as I can, so you have a little time together. She’s pretty upset.” He could hear that Alexa was too. But none of them were half as upset as Luisa when he called and told her the news.

“Are you crazy? You’re bringing her here? You can’t do that. Daisy doesn’t know that she exists.” Daisy was the ten-year-old daughter she had conceived to break up his marriage to Alexa and get him back. She hadn’t given a damn about their boys during his marriage to Alexa-she had abandoned them for eight years. She had left him for an oil tycoon in Texas, and left the boys with their father, but as soon as her new husband died, she came running back. She had used a baby to get him, and he had stupidly fallen into her trap. He had bitterly regretted it in the years since. But it was too late to do anything about it now. All he could do was try to make it up to Alexa by taking care of Savannah. He owed her at least that-Savannah was his child too.

“Well, you’d better tell her,” Tom told Luisa coldly, referring to Daisy’s not knowing she had a sister and that her father had been married to someone else. “We’ll be home tonight, and I’m not going to have Savannah pretend to be someone else. This is hard enough on her as it is.”

“Hard on her? What about me and Daisy? Did you think about that? Or have you been screwing around with her mother? Is that what this is about?”

“I just saw Alexa for the first time in ten years. Our daughter’s life is at risk here. I’m bringing her home, Luisa, like it or not.”

“You sonofabitch. I always knew you’d go back to Alexa someday.” She knew Tom didn’t love her. It didn’t matter to Luisa. She had wanted her old life back, and him, when it was convenient for her. It was always and only about her.

“She wouldn’t go near me with a ten-foot pole, and she’s absolutely right,” he said about Alexa. “I screwed her over ten years ago. The only reason she’s talking to me now is because she needs someplace to send Savannah. Someone is threatening our daughter. Probably related to the case her mother is working on. I have to bring Savannah home. Her life may be on the line.” It made him sick that he even needed to argue with her about it. Luisa didn’t have a drop of human kindness in her, or compassion. She would never have done what Alexa had for her boys. It was ironic that now Luisa was in the position of having to take care of Alexa’s child. Alexa had done it for Luisa for seven years.

“Well, don’t expect me to do anything for her,” Luisa said in a fury.

“I expect you to be civil to her, and make her as comfortable as we can.”

“Is her mother coming to see her?” Luisa sounded suspicious.

“Probably. I haven’t talked to her about it yet. I’ve only known about this for half an hour. She got another threatening letter about Savannah last night.”

“Just keep her away from me, Tom. And I mean it. Keep her out of my sight.” He loathed everything Luisa was and stood for. His punishment for what he had done to Alexa was living with Luisa now. It had been a long, hard ten years. But he didn’t have the energy, or the guts, to get divorced again. So he had made his peace with it. At a very, very high price.

He and Savannah left the hotel in Vermont a few minutes later, and Savannah was silent and looked sadly out the window for most of the drive down. He tried to tell her how much she would like Charleston and how happy he was that she’d be there with him, but Savannah clearly wasn’t in the mood to talk, and after a while he stopped talking and left her to her own thoughts. She was already homesick for New York, her mother, and her friends.

Alexa spent most of the day packing. She packed all the clothes Savannah liked best, everything she’d need for school and on the weekends. She gave her all the things Savannah coveted from her own wardrobe. She packed her schoolbooks, her favorite music, and two teddy bears she hadn’t even looked at since she was a child, but Alexa thought they might comfort her now. And if she could have, Alexa would have packed herself in the suitcase. She hated to see her leave, but they had no other choice.

Alexa called her mother and told her what had happened, and that Tom had been decent about it. Whatever she thought of him, she had to give him credit for that.

She barely had time to dress and leave for the airport. She had three good-sized valises with her and got there at four o’clock. Half an hour later Tom called her on her cell phone. He was ten minutes away, and as soon as he drove up, Savannah jumped out of the car and flew into her mother’s arms. She was sobbing, and it took her most of the time they had together to calm down. Alexa gently smoothed her hair that looked so much like her own, she held her and comforted her, and promised her she’d come to Charleston in no time, and before Savannah knew it she’d be home. Alexa barely had time to talk to Tom. He watched them unhappily, and walked away discreetly, so they could be alone. And then it was time to go. He had bought Savannah’s ticket, and Alexa insisted on paying for the excess baggage, and they both cried when Alexa had to leave. Alexa couldn’t walk them to the gate since she didn’t have a ticket herself.

“I love you,” she said over and over, and Savannah clung to her like a child. Tom finally put an arm around his daughter, and gently led her away from her mother as both women cried.

“Take care of yourself,” he said over Savannah’s head to Alexa. “I’ll take good care of her, I promise. Just see that you stay safe.” Alexa nodded and thanked him, and then they were gone, through security and heading for the gate, and Alexa couldn’t see them anymore.

She was still crying when she hailed a cab to take her back to the city, and she was exhausted when she walked into the apartment and called her mother. The plainclothesman Jack had promised was posted outside her door.

“How did it go?” Muriel asked her. She sounded worried and had thought about them all afternoon.

“It was awful. But Tom was very nice. I’m going to try and go down there next week,” Alexa said sadly. She couldn’t even imagine her life without Savannah for the next few months. And in the fall she was leaving for college. Life as they had known it was about to end, or just had.

“I’ll call her tonight,” Muriel said somberly. She hated what was happening to them, and what the trial had done to their lives. “Do you want to come over for dinner?” her mother asked her kindly, but Alexa wasn’t up to it. Seeing Savannah cry at the airport had been too hard.

“No. I just want to crawl into my bed and cry.”

“I feel terrible about this. Maybe I was wrong to tell you to send her to Charleston. But I think it’s better to be safe. Come over and have dinner anytime you want.” She knew how lonely Alexa was going to be without her daughter.

“Thanks, Mom,” Alexa said miserably. And after they hung up, she did just what she had said she would. She climbed into her bed, pulled up the covers, and cried.

The flight to Charleston took just over two hours. Savannah sat quietly in her seat, looking out the window, with tears rolling down her cheeks, and dozed off in the last few minutes. The shock of leaving home so suddenly had worn her out, and the emotions of leaving her mother had been overwhelming. Neither of them had expected this as a consequence of Alexa handling the trial. Tom watched her as she slept, and gently covered her with a blanket. He was well aware that his minimal presence in her life, and defection a decade before, had strengthened the bond with her mother to an unusual degree. Alexa was all Savannah had, and now suddenly she was being catapulted into a new world, without her. Worse yet, it was a world and life where she was not welcome, and was viewed as a threat. He was worried about Luisa, and with good reason. She wasn’t known for her kindness, warmth, and compassion, and he knew that bringing Savannah home with him was going to start a raging battle. It already had. Luisa had declared war on him that morning, and she meant it. And knowing her, the worst was yet to come.