Girls of Summer by C.E. Hilbert

Author:C.E. Hilbert [Hilbert, C.E.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Christian Fiction, inspirational fiction, Clean and Wholesome Novels, Religion and Spirituality
Publisher: Pelican Book Group
Published: 2021-02-22T00:00:00+00:00

27

Cold leather scratched at the back of Charlotte’s knees as she slid onto the backseat of the classic, black town car. The driver scurried around the front of the sedan, slipping into the driver’s seat.

“Where to miss?”

“Park and 82nd.”

Charlotte snuggled into the thick leather, closing her eyes against the familiar graffiti lined path connecting the waterfront of LaGuardia to her beloved Manhattan. She’d hated leaving South Carolina with Remy barely clinging to life. Her best friend needed her, but the only way she knew to help was to return home.

Her return wasn’t to her gallery, apartment in SoHo, or the trendsetters of Lower Manhattan. She wouldn’t be dining in Little Italy or spending the afternoon reading a book in Washington Square Park. She wasn’t returning to her life. She was entering her mother’s world in the hope of answers to her never ending questions.

Three weeks earlier, Charlotte and Mac returned to his apartment after her ballpark confession. She’d barely crossed the threshold when Special Agent Murphy began threatening her with obstruction charges, raising his voice several notes above charming. Mac flipped off his lawyer switch, and both Georgie and Dylan were required to keep Mac and Murphy from using each other’s faces for sparring instead of the heavy weight bag greeting visitors at the front door.

Murphy’s temper quickly simmered with the announcement Charlotte was willing to fly to New York to ask her mother the tough questions and testify against her if the answers were as the FBI suspected. The federal agents’ faces flashed relief, but Georgie screamed in protest.

“It’s too dangerous.” Georgie spat after she dragged Charlotte into Mac’s make-shift home office.

“I have to know, Georgie. I have to know if my mother is who these men think she is. My mind believes them. It’s logical and their facts are reasonable.”

“But…” Georgie filled in the pause.

“She’s my mother. Although sometimes it feels as though it’s merely a DNA connection, she is my mother and my heart needs to believe she has a moral compass bigger than a cereal puff.”

“I can understand,” Georgie said, but her words didn’t connect with the worry stretched across her face.

What Charlotte didn’t say was she could believe her mother’s moral compass was so shallow as to involve herself with men who used the depravity of the world to lead a life of luxury. Her mother always chose herself above everything and everyone else in life. Her mother was superficial and self-centered, but could she really be at the center of a criminal organization? Charlotte was about to discover the answer.

“Here we are, miss.” The driver’s subtle Bronx accent pulled her from her thoughts.

Charlotte glanced out the window and up to the twenty-eight-floor building her grandmother had called home since refusing to return to the familial apartment she shared with her husband, for decades, after his death. Handing the driver a few bills, she thanked him and stepped through the car door opening.

“Hello, Mr. Raymond.” Charlotte smiled at the aging doorman who seemed to be always present in her grandmother’s building.

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