Chapter Twenty

"You'll visit every day?" Ruby checked.

She, Charlie and Joey had all driven to the clinic where Ruby would be staying for a week of treatment. The plan was to stay at Joey's house nearby.

"We promise," Charlie said, hugging her daughter.

Ruby clung to her and told her that she loved her.

"And I love you too," Charlie said, looking her in the eye. "We'll be here for you no matter what, okay?"

Ruby nodded and hugged her one more time. She also hugged Joey and reluctantly let them leave.

"I feel so sorry for her," Charlie admitted.

Joey caught hold of her hand.

"She'll be fine," she assured her. "It's good that she's getting the help. And we'll only be round the corner."

"I'm intrigued about where you're taking me," Charlie admitted.

"It's a much nicer place than I could ever have dreamed of owning," Joey told her as they climbed into the car.

"Wow!" Charlie bellowed ten minutes later. "This isn't seriously yours!"

Joey had driven them as far as large, iron gates encasing a tall, stately mansion.

"Don't forget I didn't earn it," Joey told her.

She climbed out and hauled the gates open before getting back in to drive the car up the path, round the back of the house and into an empty, private car park. Charlie's mind was still spinning.

"When exactly were you going to tell me about all of this?" she wondered

"When the time was right," Joey said, parking Charlie's precious car and climbing out.

She moved to the other door and opened it for Charlie, helping her out.

Half an hour later, Charlie and Joey had taken a break from the tour of the house, getting as far as the kitchen.

"Elizabeth had lots of staff here," Joey explained, having made them both coffee, courtesy of the items they'd bought in a shop on the way to the clinic.

She led the way from the kitchen to a sitting room with a wonderful view of the gardens outside.

"She had a cook and everything," she said. "But after she died I had to let them go. I didn't need staff and I wasn't sure how long I'd be sticking around for anyway. I felt bad about getting rid of them but I did write the best references ever so I hope they've all found their way into good jobs. Plus she left all of them a grand each."

"She sounds like a very generous woman," Charlie said.

Joey spoke about her former boss with so much affection, she was intrigued to know as much about her as possible.

"She was," Joey agreed with a faint smile. "I was lucky to end up with her."

"It sounds like she was lucky to end up with you too," Charlie replied.

"Well, like I said, I don't deserve what she gave me," Joey said. "I only did what anybody else would have done."

"What did you do?" Charlie wondered.

Joey shrugged and sipped her drink.

"I was the housekeeper and I worked in the garden," she explained. "Whenever I was cleaning a room that she was in, we started chatting. After a few conversations, she started inviting me to have lunch with her. And then, when I realised she was lonely and that her son, Chris, wasn't visiting at all, I started to stay behind after work for an hour or two, just chatting to her."

"That's a bit beyond the role of a housekeeper," Charlie pointed out.

"But I enjoyed it too," Joey said. "It wasn't a chore or anything."

She smiled at the memory.

"Then I had to move out of my apartment because my landlord was selling up," she said. "Elizabeth invited me to move in so I was keeping her company even more. It was nice though. I liked hearing all her stories and stuff."

Charlie smiled affectionately at her. She could just imagine Joey, with her generous heart, giving an elderly woman all the time and attention she needed.

"I started noticing that she was wheezing a lot," Joey said, her tone suddenly sad. "We argued about it for ages and in the end she agreed to go to the Doctor just to shut me up. It turned out she had lung cancer. I was there when they diagnosed her and it was one of the worst days of my life."

She shifted and allowed Charlie to put her arm around her.

"I nursed her until the day she died," Joey told her. "I looked after her and when things were really bad, I started sleeping in her room. It's big enough that we could fit another bed in there and that meant that I could keep her safe. I held her hand as she died and…"

She sighed.

"I spoke about you a lot," she admitted. "One of the last things she said to me was that I should go and find you and try to make things work. She said that if it went wrong, at least I'd know I'd tried."

Smiling, Joey took a moment to gaze at her girlfriend.

"I am so glad I tried," she said earnestly.

Charlie leant closer and kissed her.

"So am I," she said. "You've brought a joy to my life that I really thought was gone forever."

Next time… Joey comes face to face with Chris…