Free Cutler 03 - Twilight's Child by authors_sort

questions. One day Mr. Dorfman came into my office purposely to compliment me for how well I had taken on my duties.
    "I heard the guests talking about you," he said. "They said you were very warm, very personable, and very much like your grandmother."
    I stared at him, not sure I was happy with the compliment.
    "And all the older guests just love the way you bring Christie around to greet them. You make them feel as if they're all her grandparents. That's a very nice and a very smart thing to do," he added.
    "Christie loves people," I said. "I'm not doing it for the sake of business."
    "That's good. You're doing just what's natural. Mrs. Cutler was the same way—not afraid to share her personal world with her guests. It's a large part of what made this place so special to them and continues to make it so."
    "How are we really doing now, Mr. Dorfman?" I asked.
    "We're doing all right," he said. "Not breaking any records, but holding our own real well. Congratulations," he added. "You've almost earned your diploma at Cutler's Cove University."
    I had to smile. For Mr. Dorfman to attempt a joke, it had to be something special. Despite myself, despite how I wanted things to be and what I wanted to become, the hotel had a way of taking over. Was that another part of Grandmother Cutler's legacy, or was it just the way things were destined to be?
    I gazed up at my father's portrait and once again felt his eyes on me, only now they seemed filled with glee, as if he knew the secret and enjoyed my longing to know and discover the answers, too.
     
    As soon as Jimmy was given the date of his discharge I told Mother the date of our wedding. Once my mother understood that Jimmy and I were really going to marry, she took on the arrangements for our wedding eagerly and excitedly, seeing the preparations as a way to distract herself and everyone else from all the embarrassing revelations that had occurred. I marveled at how resilient she seemed to be. Even though she knew that by now most of the hotel staff and a number of people in Cutler's Cove had learned the secret revealed in the reading of the wills, she did not behave like a woman who had suffered any sort of disgrace.
    On the contrary, Mother moved about the hotel like a restored princess, especially since Grandmother Cutler was no longer hovering over her, glaring at her and terrorizing her with her gaze and words. She was confident that none of the staff would dare laugh at her in her presence. She still believed she could become the new queen of Cutler's Cove.
    But to me she had become someone to pity, even though she had never dressed more elegantly or looked more beautiful. Her blond hair had never looked as radiant and soft, or her cerulean eyes more crystalline. Rather than appearing pale and sallow, her cheeks were rosy, her complexion peaches and cream. Looking like an animated, hand-painted Dresden doll, she moved about the hotel bestowing smiles and small talk. It was as if she felt she could shield herself from the looks of derision and words of gossip by being more ebullient and sparkling. She would dazzle the world with her jewelry and fine dresses, her beautiful hair and her graceful manner.
    And nothing fit into this new plan of hers better than her playing the role of the mother of the bride and staging what she was determined would be Cutler's Cove's most glamorous affair. She turned the sitting room of her suite into the headquarters for arranging, organizing and designing the wedding. Here she sat regally in her blue-patterned chintz chair with her small hands resting palms down on the heavy, dark mahogany frame, behaving very much like a queen, greeting the service people and tradespeople, photographers, printers and decorators. She summoned a number of them to present their ideas, products and prices, and then she made her choices like a monarch relegating those who were rejected to a beheading. Once she had made a decision to go with one or the other, the