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“I am just warning you,” he responded holding onto me tighter still. “We need to work on our marriage but divorce isn’t an option. I won’t let you go. I won’t give you to McCoy.” Was he psychic? “You’re mine…” his voice trailed off ominously on those words.
“I never said anything about divorcing you,” I snapped pulling out of his reach. Then, I swatted the pillows, laid my head down and tried to go to sleep. About three a.m. I think I might have dozed off even though James was snoring loudly.
Chapter Nine
The Thanksgiving holiday came quick. As usual in the six years that I have been married to James his mother drove to Kentucky from her home in a suburb of Memphis. She arrived the Wednesday prior to Thanksgiving in her pearl white Cadillac wearing expensive gray slacks and a winter white sweater with her small overnight bag in one hand and a black sleek, pilot suitcase in the other. She would leave on Friday following the holiday so she didn’t have to pack much. James’s mother hated being here as much as I hated having her in my home.
As was usual she lorded over me while I attempted to cook Thanksgiving dinner for us. If she wasn’t examining my every ingredient then James was behind her critiquing me. They turned me into a bundle of nerves before the dinner was on the table. My passive resistant personality kept me on silent mode while they badgered me. The emotions I kept bottled up inside me until I wanted to explode on them in a fit of rage. Later I would berate myse
lf for saying nothing to them at all.
Her small stature belied a woman of stone. Belle Ellerton had perfectly glossy dark brown hair dyed to cover the gray hairs that any woman her age would naturally have. She was in her late sixties although James was never quite sure exactly how old his mother was because she had lied about her age for so long. Her eyes were dark and intimidating fringed by beautiful long dark lashes. She had class, I had to admit but she was hard and her eyes revealed her hardness. She was cold to everyone but James, treating people with an air of richness as if they were beneath her.
Belle’s hands and feet were as perfectly manicured as her hair. She wore expensive clothing and fine jewelry that James or his father had bought for her. Her son could do no wrong in her eyes…except to marry me. What she didn’t know that I knew was that her mother was an alcoholic who had to be institutionalized because of a mental breakdown, which had forced Belle to bounce from poor relative to poor relative. She had been destitute as a child.
James had told me this in a moment of weakness revealing something about Belle that his mother would not have wanted me to know. Belle had married James’s father for his money. Martin Ellerton had been twenty years older than his young wife. From pictures, I saw that he had been a handsome man, a softer version of James who was their only child.
Martin had died when James was thirteen leaving his son to be raised by a doting mother who in my mind at least had spoiled him beyond hope. He towed the line for her. He treated her with the utmost respect that I couldn’t get an ounce of. From the start of our relationship I was jealous of the woman and intimidated by her at times too. Belle was cold and unreachable.
“Thank God the child dyed her hair to a normal color,” Belle said to me while I checked the turkey, basting it with its juices. This position bent over the steaming bird gave me the opportunity to make a face at the turkey I was working on instead of at my mother-in-law standing behind me.
“She wanted to surprise her grandmother who is having surgery next week,” I explained continuing to baste the turkey.
“James told me.” She was displeased that I was leaving James again to be with my mother during her surgery. “I really don’t think it’s a good idea for you to leave James so much. Your need to get your priorities in the right order.”
Turkey baster full of juice, I straightened and stared directly into her dark, unyielding eyes and stated, “Belle, as I explained to James, if it were you having the surgery he would be in Memphis by your side. James is forty years old. He can handle being alone for a week while I care for my mother,” I replied stiffly.
“He’s an only child. You have three sisters who could be there with her.” She glared at me unwilling to bend.
“I will be in Hell with my mother,” I declared snappily. “I would not feel right not being with her. We are very close. You should understand.”
“If you say so Gabrielle but I definitely think it isn’t good for Keegan to be out of school for so long.”
“Like you care,” I snapped. “Keegan is a straight-A student and can handle the make-up work. Not that I have to explain my actions to anyone in this house but I have discussed this with her teachers and they agree it will be better for her to handle the situation if she’s there with me and my mother instead of sitting here worrying about what is happening to her Nana.”
The anger and the dislike for this woman were evident in my voice. James chose that moment to enter the kitchen and heard my tirade. “Don’t speak to my mother in that manner.”
“James dear, I can take care of myself,” his mother purred so sweetly that I wanted to throw up on her expensive Jimmy Choo shoes. She touched his arm possessively making me feel even more of an outsider in my own home. “Finally, this girl speaks up for herself. I have more respect for her now that I see she actually does have a backbone.”
Finally I had to admit to myself that there was nothing that would ever make me compatible with James Ellerton. His mother had never liked Kat or me. She had criticized us from day one which James had shared with me making my relationship with Belle that much more difficult to endure. They both looked down on my family who were considered to be important members of the town of Hell and well liked too.
The Dawson’s had been in Hell for decades. My father had supported my mother, my sisters and I well working as a supervisor at one of the car manufacturer’s in Detroit. He had made a good living working for them his entire life coming up through the ranks. He was well liked and known as a hard worker. At Pop’s retirement party many upper level execs had attended to wish him well. He was that well liked. Yet I was not good enough for James Ellerton. That was a bitter pill to swallow.
My sisters and I had always dressed in the current styles. Micki and I couldn’t share clothes because it took me so long to catch up to her height and finally be thin enough to wear her things. My other sisters often wore our hand me downs but Yancy had taken good care of our clothing so they looked brand new.
We had a car, a small one that Michaela drove me everywhere in when we were teenagers. We were one of the few teenagers who had their own car. When I turned sixteen Michaela had to share with me until she married Byron and moved out of the house. Then it was my turn to drive my baby sisters to their events.
Belle treated me how Yancy had always treated Kerry McCoy. To some degree I understood what Kerry must have felt dealing with my mother. I was the poor white trash from the wrong side of the tracks as far as Belle Ellerton was concerned and the dent she made to my self-esteem wasn’t a good one. Worse in my mind, she and James were hurting Keegan’s self-esteem. Her comments broke my heart when Belle said things to Kat that I knew had hurt her even though she refused to allow them to know this.
Why am I here? I thought angrily to myself as I whipped the mashed potatoes with a frenzy. Every time that I visited my home in Hell it became harder and harder to come back here.
“Gabrielle, I think the potatoes have given up,” Belle declared. She knew that she had gotten under my skin and she enjoyed every minute of knowing.
“Thank you,” I replied sitting the bowl aside while I finished the remainder of the dinner preparations.
Keegan sat down at the formal dinner table after helping me transfer the multitude of dishes to the table from the kitchen. The formal china with the polished silver and the white linen napkins. All the formal settings were in place. Her butt had not been on the chair for two seconds when James started.
“Keegan put your napkin on your lap,” he commanded.
