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Jacob sat down and pulled Mack down beside him. “So, tell me . . . what brought tears to your eyes when you saw me?”
Mack looked at Dean, wondering where to begin. “I’m going to find Grandmother while you two chat.” Dean quickly kissed Mack on the forehead as he left the room.
“Now I’m more curious than before.” Jacob gave her a quizzical look.
“May I call you, Jacob?”
He smiled and patted her hand. “Seeing as you’re practically family, that would be fine. Although, I hope you will call me grandfather, eventually.”
“I just might.” Mack took a deep breath and started her story, “If I told you that Dean and I met in Cape Elizabeth at ‘Degan House,’ what would that mean to you?” She watched him carefully and saw the color drain from his face slightly as his hands began to tremble. “Jacob, I found a diary dated 1947, written by a Rose Degan. She was in love with you, wasn’t she?”
Jacob nodded. “Yes,” he whispered. He looked away from Mack and appeared to be lost in his own thoughts.
“She never married Richard,” Mack announced.
He turned back toward Mack, his eyes filled with some unknown emotion. “Pardon?”
“This isn’t easy, Jacob, but Rose was running away to be with you, when she—” Mack took a deep breath, “—she lost her footing and fell over the cliffs. Jacob, she did love you so very much, she didn’t leave you for Richard like her father told you. She just didn’t get the chance to leave with you.”
Jacob looked toward the windows and the garden beyond before he looked back at her. He was clearly agitated and it broke her heart that she was the cause of it. “I don’t know what to say.”
“Jacob, why did you wait a month to call Degan House to speak to Rose? Why not look for her that night? You knew she was pregnant, I guess it just doesn’t make any sense to me.”
“I don’t remember,” he said abruptly.
Mack was a bit surprised at Jacob’s response.
Dean came back into the room, looked first at Mack, who was upset, then his grandfather. “Is everyone okay?” he asked as he approached Mack, wiping her tears away.
“I think so,” Mack replied.
“Sorry for cutting this short, but Grandmother is waiting in the parlor and was about to head this way as she’s getting rather impatient. I’ve been sent to get you both.” He grinned. “She’s keen to meet you, Mack.”
He was leading Mack out of the room, followed by his grandfather, when Mack noticed a photograph sitting in a lovely frame on the bookcase. She walked over to have a closer look. “Who’s that?” Mack asked, pointing at the woman in the photograph. She’d seen the photograph before and knew who it was, but Jacob having it on his bookshelf, when he married someone else, just didn’t make any sense.
Jacob replied, “Eliza, my wife.”
“Mack, what is it?” Dean asked.
“The woman in this picture. It’s Rose.”
“Mack, that’s my grandmother.”
Mack heard Dean, but she couldn’t think properly because all the blood seemed to be running through her head and ears. Why did they have the picture framed? What did it mean?
It couldn’t be. Could it?
“This is the same picture Thomas has that Rose left for him. That’s Rose, not Eliza,” Mack whispered.
“What? Mack, that’s impossible.” Dean searched her face and realized she was serious.
He looked toward his grandfather, then his grandmother as she walked in. Mack took one look at her before she lost all color and dropped like a ton of bricks in a dead faint.
Dean managed to catch her . . . just.
Chapter 38
“Mack, come on, babe. Please wake up.” Dean sat on the sofa in his grandfathers study. Mack was cradled in his arms. “Why does Mack think the picture is of Rose?” he asked his grandparents.
