VANESSA was leaning on the counter next to her cash register, writing her shopping list for Thurs day’s bake-a-thon, when it occurred to her that 252 guests times four cookies each equaled one hell of a lot of baking between now and Saturday. She picked up the phone and dialed Mia’s cell.
“I think we should start baking before Thursday,” she said when Mia picked up.
“Who is this and how did you get my number?” Mia asked calmly.
“I’m the person who’s trying to figure out how much lemon glaze we’re going to have to make to glaze all these damned cookies. And have you figured out how many cookies we’re talking about here?”
Before Mia had a chance to respond, Vanessa told her.
“One thousand and eight, that’s how many.”
“Divided by twelve equals… eighty-four dozen,” Mia told her. “So we take the recipe, which makes… let’s see, I think it was-”
“Five dozen. I have the recipe right in front of me.” Vanessa bit her bottom lip. “I don’t trust that to be right, though. It’s only five dozen if you make them exactly the same size as the person who wrote the recipe, and that never seems to work for me.”
“Want to make ninety dozen, just in case?”
There was a long silence, after which both women began to laugh.
“Sure. Ninety dozen! What the hell!” Vanessa tried to make light of the task. “What’s a few dozen more?”
“It won’t take any time at all with both of us baking.”
“Seriously, I think you’re grossly underestimating the amount of time we’re going to need. Today is Tuesday. I’m thinking maybe we start tomorrow and plan to keep on baking right up to the rehearsal dinner, after which we return to our respective kitchens.”
“Maybe we need to do this in teams,” Mia suggested.
“That might work if we could recruit a few more bakers. Can you think of anyone else who could be talked into pitching in?”
“I can probably get Dorsey to make some,” Mia thought aloud. “And my cousin Aidan’s wife, Mara. She loves to bake.”
“What about your friend Annie? Isn’t the matron of honor supposed to help the bride out with all the last-minute details?”
“Yeah, but she’s in New Mexico on a case. We’re holding our breath that she gets back in time to make it to the wedding. Otherwise, you’ll be bumped from bridesmaid to maid of honor.”
“We’ll worry about that on Saturday. Today you need to find out if Annie has a kitchenette in her hotel room. We need all the help we can get.”
“We’ll be okay. I’ll just ask Dorsey and Mara. Between the four of us, we should be fine.”
“Maybe. That breaks it down to”-she tried to mentally compute-“roughly twenty-two dozen cookies each, give or take a dozen or so. And this is going to take a lot of flour, sugar, and butter. I think I’ll call over to the Market Basket while I’m thinking of it to see if I need to make a special order. I doubt they have this much butter on hand.”
“Right about now is when you get to say, ‘You should have gone with the truffles.’ “Mia sighed. “I guess this wasn’t such a great idea.”
“Of course it’s a great idea. You wanted to honor your mother’s memory and we’re going to do exactly that. I just thought I should point out that we should not wait until Thursday to start, and that we were severely understaffed.”
“If we start baking on Wednesday, they’ll be stale by Saturday.”
“No, they won’t. We’ll freeze them and put the glaze on them all on Friday. They’ll be fine.”
“According to the schedule you made up, on Friday we’re supposed to put them in boxes and tie on those pretty ribbons.”
“So we nudge the schedule a little,” Vanessa said to assure herself as much as she assured Mia. “We’ll get them into their little boxes and we’ll get the ribbons tied on and everything will be fine.”
The bell over Bling’s door rang and Vanessa looked up as a woman closed the door behind her.
“I’ll check with Ken at the market and get back to you if there’s a problem. Meantime, think about maybe three cookies per guest. That would eliminate about twenty dozen cookies if my seat-of-the-pants math is right. Gotta run…”
She hung up the phone and replaced the receiver, then moved the phone to one side of the cash register. She smiled at the potential customer.
“Welcome to Bling. May I help you find something, or are you just poking?”
“Just poking,” the woman replied.
“Poke away,” Vanessa told her cheerfully. “Let me know if there’s something you’d like to try on, or if there’s something from one of the cases you’d like a better look at.”
The woman smiled tentatively.
Vanessa watched the customer without appearing to, appraising her unconsciously. The woman appeared to be in her early thirties, her hair colored light brown but not done well. Vanessa suspected that the woman had done her color herself but wasn’t very skilled at it. Her makeup was a little heavier than what she normally saw on the weekday tourists, who tended to be very conservative in their dress and appearance. This woman wore a long sleeved T-shirt with a mock turtleneck, long pants just a hair too tight, and faux-leather shoes that were far from new and probably rubbed her feet uncomfortably. She carried an out-of-season straw bag, and her unpolished fingernails were chewed to the quick. There was an air of hesitancy about her, as if she had just realized that she’d entered a shop where she couldn’t afford to buy anything. Vanessa was no stranger to that sort of uncertainty because she’d felt it so many times before in her old life.
And, she reminded herself, there’d been more than one time in my life when I’d worn shoes very much like hers. I’ll bet hers are just as uncomfortable as mine were.
Vanessa didn’t have to look at her own hands to know that these days, her nails were buffed and polished and kept pretty with a once-a-week appointment with a manicurist, but once upon a time, the sheer stress of her life had caused her to bite her nails down to nothing, and she’d never had time for polish.
The woman walked around the shop, her eyes darting from one item to another, but her fingers never reached out to touch any of the lovely items on display. In the way she hung her head and the wariness in her eyes, Vanessa recognized something else of the woman she herself had been, once upon a time. She’d have bet her entire week’s receipts that if she pulled up the sleeves of the woman’s shirt, she’d find the imprint of angry fingers bruised into her upper arms.
“It’s a gorgeous day, isn’t it?” Vanessa said, hoping to put the woman at ease. “I think spring is finally with us for real.”
“Yes. It’s real nice out.”
“Those shorts on the rack right next to you are on sale,” Vanessa pointed out.
The woman paused to look through them. She stopped at a pair of madras plaid, glanced at the price tag, then pretended that she hadn’t blanched when she read the number.
“Are you touristing today?” Vanessa asked.
“What?” The woman frowned. “Oh. Yeah. I’m just here for the day.”
“Where are you from?”
“Oh. Um… Baltimore.” The woman averted her eyes.
“What brought you to St. Dennis?” Vanessa persisted.
“I… I heard it was a pretty town, so I decided to take the day and check it out.”
“You heard right. It’s a beautiful town. One of the nicest on the Bay.” Vanessa rested an elbow on the counter and her chin in her hand. “What have you seen so far?”
“Oh, not so much yet. I saw the place down there where all the boats are parked.” She waved in the general direction of the Bay. “Down near the parking lot.”
“Oh, the marina. It’s always fun to walk along the dock there and look at the boats. Where else have you been?”
“I had coffee across the street.”
“Good choice. I have coffee there every morning.”
“You do?”
Vanessa nodded, wondering why that tidbit would seem interesting. “I’m afraid I’m terribly lazy. I fall into a routine and I just stick with it.”
The woman, who’d turned her attention to a pile of lightweight summer sweaters, nodded vaguely.
“Is there any particular place you want to see while you’re here?” Vanessa tried to keep her customer engaged.
“Oh…” She appeared to think it over, then returned her attention to the sweaters. “Not really. I was just passing by and saw your window displays and thought your shop looked really cool.”
“Thank you.” Vanessa looked around at the little world she’d made for herself. “I think it’s pretty cool.”
The woman walked around the shop for a few more minutes before lingering over a summer party dress of white eyelet.
“Would you like to try that on?” Vanessa asked.
“Oh. I…” the woman stammered. “I don’t think…”
“Do I have your size?” Vanessa came out from around the counter and walked toward the woman, who watched her with some curiosity. “You look as if you’re… what, a size ten?”
She flipped through the hangers with ease.
“You’re in luck. One size ten left. Here you go.” She handed the hanger to the woman and pointed off to the right. “The dressing room’s right through that door. If you love it, maybe I could take a little off the price, since it’s your first time in St. Dennis.”
“That would be really nice,” the woman replied, but made no move toward the dressing room.
“Did you want to look around a little more first?”
“Oh, no. No, I’ll just take this in…” The customer backed toward the dressing room.
“Take your time.”
Vanessa strolled over to a stack of khaki shorts and straightened out the pile, then refolded some cotton T-shirts.
“How are you doing?” she called to the dressing room.
“All right.”
“Does the dress fit?”
“Yes. It fits just right.” She hesitated before adding, “It sure is pretty.”
A few moments passed before the woman emerged from the dressing room with the dress on the hanger.
“What did you think?” Vanessa asked.
“Oh, I’m not sure,” the woman told her. “Maybe I’ll come back with my husband and see what he thinks.”
“That’s perfectly fine,” Vanessa assured her. “Would you like me to put a hold on it for you? Just in case?”
“Oh, I don’t know…”
“It’s not a problem. There’s absolutely no obligation. But if you decided you wanted it, I’d hate to see you disappointed if you came back and found it had been sold. What’s your name? I can hold it as long as the weekend. We start to get real busy on Fridays now that the weather is getting warmer. But I’d be happy to hold it until then for you.” Vanessa took the hanger and hung the dress on a stand near the counter. “What’s your first name?”
“It’s Candy. Candice.”
“Candice, it is.” Vanessa wrote on a piece of paper, which she then attached to the hanger with a straight pin. “Hold till Friday for Candice,” she read the note aloud.
“Thank you,” the woman said softly.
“My pleasure.” Vanessa reached for the little porcelain dish near the cash register that held a stack of business cards. “Take one, in case you need to call.”
The woman picked up a card and appeared to study it.
“If you don’t call or stop in by noon on Friday, it’ll go back onto the floor. And if you decide you’d like it, I’ll take off twenty percent.”
“That’s real nice of you.”
She appeared about to say something else when the door opened and Steffie came in, grinning and looking like she had a tale to tell.
“It’ll be in the back room if you come back. If I’m not here, just tell whoever is that Vanessa put a dress in the back for you.”
“So you’re Vanessa,” the woman said softly.
“Yes. But anyone can get it for you if I’m not here.” Vanessa smiled as she walked toward the back room, the dress over her arm. “My brother’s getting married this weekend, so I’ll be in and out for the next few days.”
“Oh. Will the wedding be in St. Dennis?”
“Will it ever.” Steffie answered for Vanessa, who’d disappeared into the back of the store. “Ness’s brother is the chief of police and he knows everyone in town.”
“The police chief?” Candice repeated.
“Yeah, and the woman he’s marrying is a county criminal investigator, and all her brothers and cousins are FBI agents. God forbid anyone should think about committing a crime in St. Dennis over the weekend.”
“God forbid,” the woman agreed as Vanessa came back out to the shop floor. “Well, thank you for letting me try on the dress.”
“Of course. Come back anytime.” Vanessa walked her to the door and held it open for Candice to pass through. She waved good-bye from the door and closed it behind her.
“What a slow day,” Vanessa complained to Steffie. “That was it as far as customers go.”
Steffie glanced at her watch. “It’s early yet. It’s a nice, warm sunny morning. By two this afternoon, the sidewalks will be packed.”
“So what’s put that shit-eating grin on your face this morning?”
“Guess who I had coffee with while you were trying to make your first sale of the day?”
“I couldn’t even begin to guess.”
“Mountain Man.”
“Oh, Grady?” Vanessa tried to appear disinterested. “Where’d you run into him?”
“Across the street at Cuppachino. He was there with Beck and the other brother who’s going to be in the wedding and his wife.”
“Andy. Dorsey is his wife.”
“Right. And I’m here to tell you, the man is not all that dull.”
“Really? Couldn’t prove it by me.” Vanessa refolded a stack of T-shirts. “I met him at Hal’s party the other night. I wasn’t impressed.”
“You lie.”
“No, seriously. I wasn’t at all…”
Steffie started to laugh.
“What’s so funny?” Vanessa raised an indignant eyebrow.
“Did you know that when you try to tell a lie, your eyes shift to one side?”
“You’ve been watching too much TV,” Vanessa grumbled.
“Seriously, Ness.” Still grinning, Steffie rested her el bows on the counter. “How could you not be impressed? He’s good-looking, articulate, smart, interesting-”
“You got all that over one cup of coffee?”
“And a cheese Danish.”
“A Danish?” Vanessa raised an eyebrow. “What happened to the water diet you were on a few days ago?”
“This was a special occasion.”
“Well, since you so obviously think this guy’s got it all, I say go for it.”
“Thanks, but he’s not my type.”
“Stef, you just finished telling me that he’s-”
“He’s all those things I said. He’s a really nice guy. But…” Steffie shrugged. “No spark. Know what I mean?”
Vanessa stared at Steffie. “I’m… speechless.”
“I know.” Steffie grinned. “I could hardly believe it myself. But you know how I always know the minute I meet a guy if there’s ever going to be something there or not?”
Intrigued, Vanessa nodded.
“Well… nothing.” Steffie held up both hands. “Nada. Zilch.”
“Wow. Who’d have guessed it?” Vanessa’s eyes began to twinkle. “The first really hot single guy to hit St. Dennis since I moved here, and Steffie isn’t feeling the love. I guess stranger things have happened. Perhaps not in my lifetime, but still…”
“There is an explanation.”
“Do tell.”
Steffie leaned over the counter. “I heard that Beck invited Wade MacGregor to the wedding and that he’s coming in on Friday. And that he isn’t bringing a date.”
“I saw the name on the guest list, but I don’t know who he is.”
“He’s a guy who used to pal around with my brother. He and Beck used to sail together.”
“Just a guy?”
“Just the guy. As in, the guy I wrote about in my diary. The guy I walked three blocks out of my way every day just to go by his house. The guy who broke my heart when he took Krista Blackwell to the prom junior year.”
“How about senior year?”
“I don’t remember who he took his senior year, but my senior year, I wanted to ask him but my mom wouldn’t let me.”
“Why not?”
“Because she thought he was too old for me.”
“How much older?”
“Like, four years.”
“That’s a lot when you’re in high school, Stef. He’d have been in college already.”
“He was. I invited him to my graduation party, and he came and brought me flowers.” Steffie’s eyes took on a dreamy look. “I made him kiss me out back near the grape arbor.”
“What happened next?”
“You mean after the kiss that set the standard for the entire rest of my life and has never been duplicated?” Stef made a face. “He was outta there so fast I barely even saw him leave. Left me brokenhearted. Never wrote, never called.”
“So you would want to see him again… why?”
“I guess just to see what I missed.”
“Uh-uh. Wrong answer.”
“There’s a right answer?” Steffie frowned.
“Yes. The correct response would have been, ‘So that he can see what he missed.’”
“Well, that goes without saying.” Steffie fluffed up her long blond hair.
“So where’s he been all these years?”
“I don’t know. No one ever really seems to talk about him. Everyone talks about his sister, of course. His sister is… wait for it now.” Steffie paused dramatically. “Dallas MacGregor.”
“Dallas MacGregor, the movie star?” Vanessa’s eyes widened. “I did hear that she was a local.”
“Not exactly. Her great-aunt is a local, lived here all her life. Still does, even though she’s like a million years old by now. Dallas used to visit a lot when she was a kid. Believe it or not, she and my brother had a thing going once upon a time. When their dad died, her mother and brother moved in with the great-aunt for a while so that Wade could go to school here. Dallas was older than Wade and she was already in college by then. She did come back in the summers, at least, until Wade finished high school and their mom moved away. You always see stuff in the magazines and newspapers about Dallas, but I never hear much of anything about Wade. I imagine someone in town knows what he’s been up to. Beck must hear from him.”
“I’m sure Beck knows. Want me to pump him?”
“No, thanks. He’ll know why you’re asking and he’ll tell Wade. I’d rather ambush him.” Steffie grinned.
“Well, then, have you gotten a dress yet?” Vanessa walked to the front of the shop. “Because if you haven’t…” She pulled a silk sheath in pastel water-colors from the rack. “This little number just happens to be your size.”
“Ohhh. Gorgeous! The colors…” Steffie reached out with both hands. “Gimme…”
Vanessa laughed and handed over the dress. “You know where the dressing room is.”
Minutes later, Steffie stepped out wearing the dress and pronounced, “I am an absolute goddess in this dress.”
“Oh, my. You certainly are.” Vanessa nodded. “It’s perfect on you.”
Stef looked at the tag and gulped. “Think I could get the same twenty percent off that you offered the woman who just left?”
“I can do better than that. Since it’s so perfect for you-and I admit I did think of you when I ordered it in-I’ll give it to you at cost.”
“Gasp.” Steffie held a hand to her heart.
“The offer comes with strings.”
“Anything. You name it. Lifetime unlimited ice cream-delivered to your door. A flavor named after you…”
“Loan me one of your girls to cover the shop for Saturday afternoon until closing. Nan is working for me on Thursday and most of Saturday, but her grandson is being christened on Sunday in Virginia and she needs to leave on Saturday by four. I’ve asked everyone I can think of. I just need someone until seven. All she’ll have to do is turn off the lights and lock the front door.”
“What about your cash receipts?”
“They can wait until Sunday morning.”
“Don’t you think that might be tempting fate? Oh, I know, there hasn’t been a robbery on Charles Street in years, but still.” Steffie went into the dressing room to change.
“Maybe I’ll stop in after the reception.”
“I’ll talk to Cathy about it. She’s my best counter girl. I’ve had her close for me several times.”
“That would be worthy of a deep discount,” Vanessa said. “But that raises the question of what you’ll do.”
“I’ve had several of the others close for me from time to time.” Steffie emerged from behind the curtain with the dress. “But even if I have to leave the reception for a bit to close up both our shops, I’d do it in a heartbeat.” She opened her bag and withdrew her wallet. “And I’d say we have a deal…”
It was almost dark when Vanessa locked up and walked the three blocks to her house on Cherry Street. There had been a brief shower earlier in the afternoon, and the rain had washed some of the tree pollen from the sidewalks, leaving the air clean and fresh. She inhaled deeply as she strolled along, admiring the spring flowers her neighbors had planted. The entire front yard of the small brick Colonial on the corner of Cherry and Mavis was planted in yellow and red tulips that brightened the entire block. Three houses up, the owners had planted hundreds of mixed daffodils. And farther up, one house in from the next corner, sat Vanessa’s pride and joy. She never minded the walk, because she never grew tired of catching that first glimpse of her house as it came into view.
Off-white clapboard with a high slate roof, gables on each side of the second floor, and two deep porches-one front, one back-the house was a hodgepodge architecturally, but she’d fallen in love with it the minute she saw it.
“It’s a bit of a bastard child, architecturally,” Hamilton Forbes, the Realtor, had told her while he unlocked the front door that Saturday afternoon back in September. “I’d be hard-pressed to put a name tag on it. It’s not quite Colonial, not quite Victorian, though it does have features of each. The layout suggests a bungalow, but it was built before that style became popular. It’s in desperate need of updating and hasn’t been painted in God knows how many years, but it’s sturdy and the mechanicals are decent. The estate is leaving the contents, so you’ll have furniture. Some of it is pretty good, actually, and God only knows what’s in that attic. Everything has been covered since Miss Ridgeway’s death.”
Vanessa had barely heard a word once she’d stepped inside. There were hardwood floors and an oddly placed mantel on one of the dining room walls. White sheets covered every piece of furniture in the place. There were several bay windows and a kitchen with a real nook that overlooked the backyard. She’d all but sprinted past the Realtor to get to the second floor, where there were three good-size bedrooms and one tiny one, and one and a half baths. A door led to an attic that had thick wooden rafters and lots of dark corners in which boxes holding who knew what were stacked. She’d run back downstairs to the kitchen, and unlocked the back door. She stepped out onto the porch, her eyes sweeping across the backyard hungrily. She knew next to nothing about plants, but her mind’s eye filled in the empty beds with color and the dry fishpond with water, koi, and water lilies.
She wanted the house so much she could barely breathe.
“… been on the market for quite some time…” Ham had droned on, but she hardly heard him. “… right before her one-hundredth birthday and she-”
“What?” Vanessa had been in the kitchen again, wondering how much a new stove and refrigerator would cost.
“I said, the woman who lived here died right before her birthday. She’d have been one hundred years old, if she’d made it another three weeks.”
“Was she the oldest inhabitant of St. Dennis?”
“Not by a long shot. Penny Grassi’s one-hundred-and-two-year-old great-grandmother lives in the Oakes Retirement Home, and old Mr. Ivens Sr. is almost one hundred and three. I’m sure there are others I don’t know about.” He grinned. “We grow ’em old down here on the Bay.”
“You said the house has been on the market for a long time?”
“Close to a year now.”
“Why’s that, do you suppose?” Before he could respond, she walked back into the dining room and asked, “Do you suppose there’s a fireplace behind that wall where the mantel is?”
“I’d certainly look into that.” He followed her into the room. “It sure does look like it might have been a working fireplace. Let’s take a look outside, see where the chimney is.”
He went out the front door, and Vanessa followed him.
“Yes, see? There’s your chimney.” He pointed to the side of the house where the chimney rose past the roof. “You could look into opening that up. I’d call Stan Westcott and have him take a look.”
Vanessa had nodded and gone back inside to take another walk from room to room, her head spinning.
“Why did you say the house had been on the market for so long?” Before she arrived, Hal had primed her to focus on anything negative as a bargaining chip. The only negative she could think of was maybe there was a problem with the deed, or the structure, something that wasn’t readily visible, because to her eye, the place was perfect.
“I started to tell you about the previous owner. Alice Ridgeway was a little… eccentric. She never left her house except to water her plants, maybe toss some fish food into that pond, putter around in her backyard. Never came out the front, had one of the neighbor boys mow the lawn. Of course, the pond is dry now, but at one time, she had an impressive number of koi out there.”
“But what does that have to do with the house not selling?”
Ham cleared his throat. “There are some who think Miss Ridgeway never did leave.”
The silence hung in the air between them for a very long moment.
“Oh.” Vanessa paused. “You mean, she might still be here?”
“In spirit only.”
“I see.” Vanessa wandered from room to room and tried to decide if she felt something otherworldly accompanying her. “Has anyone actually seen her?”
“A few of the neighbors claim to have, but who knows?” He shrugged. “Maybe we see what we want to see.”
Vanessa thought that he might be sorry to have brought it up. Still, there was that full-disclosure thing.
“What was she like?” Vanessa asked. “When she was alive, that is.”
“She was… well, as I said, a bit eccentric. Kept to herself, always did, as I recall. She read a great deal, I remember that about her. My sister worked for the library many years ago, and would bring books to her and pick them up when she was finished with them and take them back. Brought her a new stack twice a week.”
“I’m not seeing where she was so eccentric. Lots of people don’t like to leave their homes.” Vanessa defended the home’s departed-or not-owner.
“True enough. But to the best of my knowledge, Miss Ridgeway was the only true agoraphobic in St. Dennis.”
“Well, then, that gave her some distinction, didn’t it?” She gazed out the kitchen window. “I wonder what she had planted in those beds.”
“Well, she did have a big herb garden, and they say she liked those bug-catching plants.”
“What?” Vanessa turned to face him.
“Venus flytraps, that sort of thing.” He hastened to add, “But I hear she liked mint, too. Had several varieties. And as I said, she had her herbs. Those who know say she had bunches hung over the doors and some of the windows. I noticed there’s some still around, here and there.”
“Her version of room freshener, I suppose.”
“Miss Grace could probably tell you more about it. She grew up right around the block there.” He pointed out the back door toward the rear of the property. “That’s the old Abernathy place right through there. You can see the back of the carriage house right beyond those trees. I believe Miss Grace’s mother may have known Miss Ridgeway.”
They’d already been in the house for over an hour, and there was no mistaking the fact that Ham was more than ready to leave. With great reluctance, Vanessa followed him out the door and watched him place the key back into the lockbox. She’d wanted to grab it from him so that she could stay awhile longer, but she was supposed to meet Hal and Beck at Lola’s for dinner and she was already late.
She’d been almost hyperventilating by the time she reached Lola’s.
“So what did you think of the old Ridgeway place, Ness?” Hal had asked after Vanessa had taken a seat at the table.
“It’s so… perfect. Just… perfect.” The words came out in a rush. “There’s a fireplace in the living room and maybe another one in the dining room but that one’s boarded up so it’s tough to know for sure if there’s a fireplace there or not, but there’s a chimney outside so it could be.” She turned to Beck and grabbed him by the arm. “It has bay windows… I always wanted to live in a house with bay windows. And this funky kitchen with old cabinets but I could paint them and maybe do something with the floor in there because it’s-”
“Ness.” Beck waved a hand in front of her face. “Take a breath.”
She did.
“So I guess you liked it, then,” Hal said.
“Oh, I loved it.”
“I knew you would.”
“Fat lot of good it does, but yes”-she sighed-“I love it. If I were in a position to buy a house, I’d be back in Ham Forbes’s office signing the papers right now.”
“Well, now, maybe we could give you a little help with that,” Hal said gently.
“What are you talking about?”
“Ham probably mentioned that the house is held by an estate. It passed to a niece of Miss Ridgeway’s who came down here once, for the funeral, and hasn’t been back since. I heard she isn’t hurting for money, but still, she has to keep up the taxes, keep the house heated so that the pipes don’t freeze, and she pays one of the Morton boys to keep the lawn mowed.” Hal rested both arms on the table in front of him. “Add to that the fact that the market’s slow and we’re headed toward winter, and I’m thinking we could make a low offer and see what happens.”
Vanessa stared at him as if he were mad.
“Hal, we can’t get the price down low enough for me to cough up a down payment. I have savings but not that much.”
“I doubt the mortgage payments would be more than what you’re paying in rent for that apartment you’re in now,” Beck noted.
“That may be, but like I said, I don’t have…”
Hal and Beck exchanged a conspiratorial look.
“What?” she asked.
“Beck and I have been real proud of the way you put that business of yours together,” Hal told her. “You have a real fine work ethic, Ness, and a real head for business. You pay your bills on time, and from what I hear from the ladies in St. Dennis, you carry real nice stuff there in the shop. Classy, they tell me. You contribute to the community in a lot of ways, and you’ve made a place for yourself here in St. Dennis.”
“Thank you.” Her eyes welled. “It’s the only place where I ever felt I belonged.”
“Of course you belong here.” Beck patted her on the back. “You’ve earned your place.”
“Now, as you know, I’ve bought up properties here and there in town. Like the building your shop is in, and the ones on either side. I have a lot invested in St. Dennis, so I don’t like to see vacant buildings. It’s bad for the town’s image, especially since we’re trying to establish ourselves as a tourist destination. We’ve come a long way in the past five years, but we have a lot more to clean up before we can compete with some of the other Bay towns. That’s why I bought some of those old warehouses over by the marsh. I’m thinking maybe something like an antique mall would be good in there, once I finish the renovations.” Hal stopped and turned to Beck. “What do you think of that idea?”
“I think it’s a good one,” Beck replied, “but I also like the idea of a boatbuilding venture.”
“That’s another thing altogether, and a conversation for another day,” Hal said. He turned back to Vanessa. “So I’m thinking that I’m going to buy Miss Ridgeway’s property from the estate myself, then sell it back to you for whatever I pay for it.” He took a sip of the one beer he limited himself to each evening. “That is, if you want it.”
Vanessa’s mouth moved, but nothing came out except a squeak.
“Nod if that was a yes.” Beck elbowed her.
She nodded, her eyes as big as dinner plates.
“You’ll make the mortgage payments to me,” Hal continued. “I’m thinking a fifteen-year mortgage at four percent would be about right.”
Still no intelligible sound from Vanessa.
“Cat got your tongue, Ness?” Beck teased, and she burst into tears.
Hal made his offer, and after some brief and halfhearted negotiations on the seller’s part, the offer was accepted. They’d agreed upon a thirty-day settlement, much to the seller’s delight. Vanessa moved in the day of settlement, and as soon as all the paperwork cleared, Hal resold the house to her just as he’d promised.
That had been last fall, and she hadn’t missed a payment to Hal or an escrow payment for her taxes. Once a month, she took Hal to dinner, and she handed over her mortgage payment right before dessert and coffee. Sometimes Beck joined them, but more often than not, it was just Hal and Vanessa. In him, she’d found the father she’d never known. In her, he’d often said, he’d found the daughter he’d always wanted, the daughter he might have had if Maggie had stayed with him when she brought Beck those many years ago, instead of turning tail and running away again.
Even now, six months later, Vanessa’s heart lifted when she drew close enough to see the pink and purple tulips she’d planted along the front walk and around the porch right after she moved in. From inside, a soft light glowed, the timer having turned on a lamp in the living room’s bay window.
“My house,” she whispered to herself as she unlocked the front door. “Mine.”
Vanessa never once crossed the threshold of the house on Cherry Street without feeling immensely grateful that Maggie had sent her to meet Beck. It was the one truly good thing her mother had ever done for her. In coming to St. Dennis, Vanessa had found so much more than a half brother. She’d found herself.