Chapter 2

Tobias and Dorothy followed Jacob into his grand office and library, closing the ten-foot tall mahogany doors behind them as they entered it’s luxurious interior.

Kim led William into the den.

Those doors, like the silk runners and so many of the other things in the house, had been made in China and sent home from there while the Dalton’s were still on their honeymoon.

Their home had been built for them while they were away. The office was about twenty by twenty, a large room for the era that it had been built in, some thirty years before.

The family had owned most of the land around the first house where grandfather Miles Dalton had been born and they had continued to live on their farmland for two centuries. All the children had homes built for them on the family’s land as they married.

The family had developed some of the land over the generations, but still owned thousands of acres of timber and more left for farming and ranching.

The town of Terrance Burg was, built by their great grandfather of Jacob, and the family still owned most of it. The leases from those shops were just a small part of the family’s monthly income, which was ample, indeed.

Tobias had come to see Jacob on this particular day to complain, again, about his monthly allowance. Since Jacob doled out the family money now, Tobias had come to Jacob for an increase in his allowance from the estate.

Dorothy understood why Jacob was now in charge of dispersing the monthly checks from Tobias’s grandmother’s estate. She had become too ill to do it for herself as of late. Her health had been in a slow decline for years and Jacob had taken on more of her responsibilities.

Dorothy knew nothing of her husband’s secret life or that Jacob and Tobias had been intimate.

That was only one of the reasons that Tobias wasn’t the “great catch” that most everyone still thought that he was.

There were many people who knew about Tobias’s secret life, but on the other side of town.

Tobias was an adult, and was sexually active after all. The problem was that Tobias’s needs weren’t always satisfied at home by Dorothy.

Word had leaked out about his “nocturnal missions,” so to speak. But he traveled in a very discreet crowd. These men were all invested in keeping one another’s secrets. These men were all very wealthy and could keep a secret if it saved them from the prying eyes of society and their downfall.

None of them wanted to be discovered at this point in their lives or at this time in history. It wouldn’t have gone well for them

Tobias worked as well and as hard as anyone would with the same allowance and other income that he received from the estate. His wife had a little money of her own when they married, and she had started a home decorating business to bring in more income.

Dorothy loved meeting “new friends” and teaching them the art of “southern living at its finest.”

Between the two of them they had fifteen thousand dollars a month or so coming in. But lately it didn’t seem to be enough. That’s what this meeting with Jacob was all about.

Tobias and Dorothy both wanted, and actually needed an increase in their monthly allowance.  Sadly, neither one of them had much sense when it came to money in the first place.

Neither one of them thought it was necessary to create a budget, and live by it. They had wealthy families behind them after all, and they both worked.

Dorothy tried but couldn’t figure out where all the money was going. She had talked to her husband but with little results. Dorothy thought that these financial problems were just a bump in the road.

Tobias controlled his family’s money for the most part, and he wasn’t talking much to Dorothy about it or where the money was going.

Truth be known, Tobias had need of much more money than he had coming in. He was busy dating several men when he had told his wife that he was out at night selling more insurance.

One of those men he dated more than once might even be a blackmailer now.

Tobias wasn’t sure yet, but one of his lovers was very insistent on receiving cash on a very regular basis. Tobias hadn’t called it what it was yet, but he would have to, soon enough.

Dorothy’s life was slowly crumbling around her as if termites were working their way through her family home but she had no idea how bad it really was. She was just coming to grips with the financial mess when the midnight phone calls started.

Yes, Tobias and Dorothy were selfish and indulgent. But at least they had decided never to have children.  They were far too selfish and busy trying to live this perfect life that they thought they had created together.

Tobias complained to Dorothy’s about her spending now, and Dorothy complained to Tobias about his late nights out.

Tobias was spending most nights, away “working,” but there was no increase in the amount of money coming in to show for it. In fact, there was less money than before and Dorothy was getting suspicious.

Dorothy knew going into this marriage that Tobias’s work would require many nights away from home, but his income wasn’t increasing with the more time that he was spending away at night.

Tobias had become even more secretive lately as well about his calls and where he was off to, and that made Dorothy ask more questions as their income dropped rather than increased as each month passed. And then those phone calls started.

So, here they sat. In front of Mr. Jacob Dalton, their benefactor. Jacob was the man who now controlled the money from Tobias’s grandmother’s estate.

Dorothy understood now that her life wasn’t as perfect as she had hoped it would be. And now she was just about to see how troubled it really was.

Jacob was tall and had an athletic build. He didn’t work out in his home gym anymore, he preferred the “Y” in town. He, didn’t work out that much anyway, he just had great genes and never seemed to gain a pound.

He had wavy, blond hair, bright, blue eyes, and a square jaw. He was a man’s man, but in more ways that most people knew.

Jacob had married Helen, Kim’s mother, some thirty odd years ago. He had loved her at the time, and for many years after.

He had always loved her for giving him his children, and for the help that she had been while he built his business. They had never struggled as much as others, but it was a hard time in the beginning and they had bonded over the work to get Jacob established. His family didn’t always pamper him. They did it just enough to keep him under their control. Helen thought their life together would be perfect. Jacob had come from one of the wealthiest families in the South, after all.

 Helen could see by the way Jacob worked in college that he would always provide well for her even if he lost all of his families money and help. He had impressed her with his work ethic and by the way he treated her.

Jacob’s one great problem was his sexual confusion growing up.

Jacob had always kept busy with school and working in his family’s business so as not to be confronted by it. But the confusion always lurked in the back of his mind.

He considered those matters dealing with work to be the most important to him at the time and left the sexual matters on the shelf, so to speak.

But then he met Helen.

That’s when he had to take stock of his sexuality.

Helen woke him from a deep slumber of sorts and caused his heart to ache like no other man or woman had in his past.

He had just graduated university when Helen told him that he had graduated in another way as well. Jacob was going to be a father.

The engagement was short, and the wedding was a grand affair. The honeymoon was a long one.

Grandfather Miles took them for a drive through great swaths of the family’s land before they left.

They were shown many suitable lots to build their new home on. The land varied from flat to hills, and from rocky to verdant.

Helen finally picked a spot on a low hill overlooking the little town of Terrance Burg.

There was a massive forest in the rear of the property, and several hundred acres of family farmland that lay beyond that.

There was a rushing river running across the land, and they often took the children there, when they could, to fish and play. Some of the land was rented to share croppers and always would be.

Jacob’s children, and their children, that would come some day in the distant future would always be the landlords. As far as Jacob and the family were concerned, their family’s lives would go on in the same fashion forever.

But now Tobias and Dorothy were seated in front of Jacob.

They were prepared to sit in front of him and beg for more money. Dorothy couldn’t figure out what had gone so wrong.

“Where the hell had all the money gone?” she wondered.

As they sat down in front of Jacob, they saw Jacob reach up and  pull down a ledger from the shelf with the name of Tobias Smith written on the spine.

This book contained the history of all the payments made to Tobias from the family fortune, even before Dorothy had married him.

There would be no guesswork here. It was all in black and white, and somewhere at some point this evening Tobias would have to come clean, and have hell to pay.