The Girl I Used to Be: A gripping and emotional page-turner, Heidi Hostetter [shoe dog free ebook .TXT] 📗

moment to enjoy a blast of blissful air conditioning, she drove across the street to the Brockhurst gates and was buzzed into the courtyard. She parked in the shade, then retrieved her portfolio and got out. Filled with purpose, if not yet confidence, she crossed the cobblestone courtyard to the front door and pressed the bell.

The carved mahogany doors were opened almost immediately by a uniformed member of the Brockhurst staff.

“Mrs. Goodman?”

“Yes.”

“Mrs. and Miss Brockhurst are expecting you. If you’d follow me please, I’ll let them know you’re here.”

He led Jill to a sitting room off the main foyer. It was bright and elegant, decorated in classic shades of French blue and pale yellow that reminded Jill of a jeweled Fabergé egg. The wallpaper was hand-painted in a soft blue that served as a canvas for everything else in the room, from the crown molding on the ceiling to the cherrywood bookcases flanking the windows on the far wall. Jill stepped closer to the windows, marveling at the panes of antique leaded glass and how they absorbed then softened the bright morning sun. Beside the windows were rich damask draperies in soft yellow, tied back with a navy tassel braided with gold thread. But the impressionist art on the wall was the most striking thing about the room, intricately framed and lit from below. Jill wondered if the paintings were original, then decided they likely were. In addition to her work with art museums, Georgiana Brockhurst was known to have one of the finest impressionist art collections in New Jersey.

Because she hadn’t been told where to sit, Jill made her way to a chair covered in rich silk damask. The upholstery was so luxurious that Jill couldn’t resist running her fingertips along the fabric. The pattern of deep yellow honeysuckle flowers and bright green hummingbirds was so intricate that it could only have been hand-embroidered. Curious as she was, Jill turned her focus to the door. It wouldn’t do to have Mrs. Brockhurst enter the room to see Jill turning over the furniture to examine the quality of the fabric.

Instead, Jill sat down gracefully, crossing her legs at the ankle, as she’d seen on television. If Mrs. Brockhurst’s office was wired with security cameras, as Marc’s was, what the video would show was someone who knew how to conduct herself in polite society.

Suddenly the door opened, and two women entered the room. The first to enter was Georgiana Brockhurst, wearing an original Chanel suit, dove gray with a cream silk blouse and a layering of pearl and gold beaded necklaces that were probably worth more than Jill’s first car. Mrs. Brockhurst looked older in person than she did in her pictures, though she was no less commanding. She had an air about her, a confidence about her place in the world. Jill rose from her seat immediately, resisting the temptation to curtsy.

Libby followed in her grandmother’s wake. The smile she flashed Jill was wide and reassuring, and Jill felt herself relax. As Libby crossed the room, it occurred to Jill that she’d only ever seen Libby in bike shorts and the faded Radcliffe sorority T-shirt she wore to spin, and it was striking how different Libby looked outside class. She was a younger version of her grandmother, in a simple gray sheath dress and a single strand of pearls, and just as confident. It occurred to Jill that Libby might be training to take over her grandmother’s philanthropy work in the future. She’d be good at it, Jill decided. Despite her wealth and influence, Libby was very down to earth. She’d listened to Jill’s ideas, looked at Jill’s work, and had arranged this meeting because she liked what she saw. For that, Jill was grateful.

Mrs. Brockhurst made her way to the chair behind the desk, and Libby sat beside Jill.

Libby leaned toward Jill and lowered her voice to a whisper. “You look nervous. Don’t be. This will be so much easier than Dave’s 6 a.m. class.”

Jill smiled in return, reassured.

When Mrs. Brockhurst was settled, the meeting began.

Libby’s tone changed, becoming more formal. “Jill Goodman, may I present my grandmother, Mrs. Georgiana Brockhurst?” Then Libby addressed her grandmother. “Grammy, this is Jill Goodman, the photographer I told you about.”

“I’m honored to make your acquaintance, Mrs. Brockhurst.” Jill winced at her awkward and stiff tone. The only part of this meeting she hadn’t rehearsed was the greeting. Clearly, she should have.

“Jill Goodman.” The older woman’s gaze sharpened, though not unkindly, and Jill found herself wondering what Mrs. Brockhurst had been like when she was younger. Newspaper accounts mentioned that she wasn’t born into privilege, but they didn’t provide much background on her life prior to her marriage to the much older Franklin Brockhurst III. “Are you related to Marc Goodman, the developer for the Summit Overlook neighborhood? The one that borders the arboretum?”

Jill tensed. The neighborhood Marc had developed four years ago was divisive. The land had originally been a green space, a parcel the state no longer wanted and had offered for sale at auction. Most people had assumed it would remain a park and so there hadn’t been much interest in buying it. Marc and his partners had snapped it up at a bargain price, and bulldozers had arrived almost immediately to clear the land, surprising local residents and sparking months of protests and lawsuits. Neighbors had hurled insults and accusations from their car windows as they’d driven by.

In the end, the land commission had apologized for the quick sale but insisted that no laws had been broken. Marc had won the fight, but he paid a price. Affluent clients who may have been interested in his custom builds were put off by the news reports, so Marc had had to work harder to find clients, and the development had taken longer to finish than he’d anticipated. In the meantime, the Goodmans had been pariahs in their own neighborhood.

“Yes, he’s my husband,” Jill answered, as neutrally as she could.

“Interesting.” Her expression