At the River’s Edge The Chesapeake Diaries (36 page)

“Be my guest.” Sophie tucked the notebook away. “Did your great-grandmother live in St. Dennis?”

“Most of her life. She had to use her maiden name on her work because my great-grandfather thought it was scandalous that she would sell her paintings and make money from them.” Ellie smiled. “She left a fortune in artwork in that house on Bay View Drive. Fortunately, my best friend knows art—she owns galleries here and in Europe—and she knew the work right away. Carly—my friend—has them all now, and she’s cleaning them and preparing them for exhibit.”

“So are you going to let your friend sell all those
Carolina Ellis paintings that you found?” Vanessa asked.

“I have mixed feelings,” Ellie admitted. “On the one hand, Carly tells me that the money those paintings could fetch would be phenomenal, especially if someone wanted the entire collection. On the other hand, I didn’t know my great-grandmother, and all I have of her are those paintings and her journals, so I don’t know. Fortunately, I don’t have to make a decision now. I told Carly she could display them after they’ve been restored. She’s been a really good friend to me, and for her to have an exclusive would be good for her business. But sometimes I think maybe the paintings should stay in St. Dennis.” Ellie shrugged. “Cam and I are doing okay with his contracting business, so I don’t feel inclined to make an immediate decision on selling them.” She slapped her hands together. “But right now, we have other work to do. I’m going to run out to the hardware store and see if I can find some good razor blades to start on those windows. I can pick up the white paint for the tables while I’m there.”

Over the next few hours, the women worked at their tasks, interrupted only when someone thought of a funny story to share, or when a song came on the radio that they all chimed in on. Occasionally a song would play that enticed them all to momentarily abandon their work and dance fever would break out. By the end of the morning, the chairs were all painted and the dishes sorted into piles of “stay” and “go.” The previous owner’s name had been scraped from the front window, and Ellie had begun to sketch the new design onto the glass.

“If you’ll trust me with the sign, I’d like to take it home with me to work on,” she told Sophie. “Sure. Go for it.”

“Just promise me that if you don’t like the way it looks, or if you don’t like the way I’ve interpreted your design, you’ll say so. I swear, you won’t hurt my feelings,” Ellie told her.

“I promise. I’m excited to see what you’ll come up with.”

“It’s ten minutes till one,” Brooke announced from the kitchen doorway. “If Sophie’s going to be at work by two—and trust me, Jesse will notice—I think we should knock off, drive into town, and grab some lunch.”

“Great idea,” everyone agreed.

“Who’s minding your businesses?” Sophie asked.

“My mother is at the bakery, and Vanessa and Steffie both have full-time employees,” Lucy told her. “I don’t have another wedding at the inn until next weekend, so I was able to take a day off. And Cam gave Ellie the day.”

“I appreciate all the help, I really do. Please give my thanks to everyone who made this possible.” Sophie felt almost overwhelmed by the gestures of friendship that had been offered that morning.

“It’s the least we can do,” Steffie told her as they all gathered their bags and Sophie turned off the lights. “We can’t wait till you open. We’ve been needing a nice place to meet for lunch. I just know that Blossoms is going to be just the thing.”

Agreeing to meet up with the others for a quick bite at the Crab Claw just outside of town, Sophie locked the doors and got into her SUV, then fell into line
behind Vanessa and Lucy. Having something to take her mind off her disagreement with Jason had been welcomed, but as she passed by his property she felt the pang in her chest return. She hated not talking to him, but at the same time, she wasn’t sure how to resolve the problem, or if there even was a resolution. Of course, he did have every right to put whatever he wanted on his property, whether she liked it or not. So far, it appeared he wanted those piles of dirt to stay right where they were.

She sighed heavily as she stopped for the stop sign. Who’d have thought that her new romance would be derailed by a pile of mushroom soil?

Jason watched the women stream out of the building next door and disappear into the cars that were parked out front. A moment later, Sophie came out and locked the front door before getting into her SUV and falling in line with the small caravan that exited her side of the parking lot. It seemed that half the women in St. Dennis had shown up at Sophie’s place and they’d all come to work. Nice that she had such support from her friends.

He called to the workman who was loading mulch onto a truck to meet him at the Enright property on Old St. Mary’s Church Road, then peeled out of the parking lot. He was running late and hated to keep Curtis waiting. Of course, thinking about Curtis only made him think about Sophie. As if he needed something else to call her to mind. It seemed he couldn’t think of much else lately.

Curtis was at the end of the drive, not bothering to
hide the fact that he was waiting for Jason’s truck to pull in.

“Someone dropped off a load of trees,” Curtis said by way of a greeting. He pointed toward the middle of the yard. “I don’t think they’re the trees we talked about.”

“Well, then, let’s take a look.” Jason dropped out of the cab and accompanied Curtis across the lawn. The mole tunnels were gone, he noticed, making a mental note to remind the contractor to send in his bill.

“See, we asked for pines.” Curtis stood in front of the stand of balled and burlapped evergreens. “These don’t look like pines to me.”

“They’re not pines,” Jason told him. “These are blue spruce, and these taller ones are cryptomeria.”

“I thought we ordered all pines,” Curtis insisted.

“No, you decided you didn’t want pines. You wanted something different, you said.”

“I did?” The old man looked momentarily confused.

“You did,” Jason assured him. “But if you’ve changed your mind, and you just want pine trees here, I can send these back and put in another order.”

“What do you think?”

“I think these are going to look just fine. Especially the cryptomeria. They grow really tall and will provide nice privacy.”

“Why do I need privacy?”

“Well, you said you wanted to block the view from the river.”

“Oh. Well, I suppose those tall trees will do that.”

“They will.” Jason nodded, trying to conceal his
alarm. Curtis was usually really sharp, not at all confused the way he appeared now. It wasn’t just that he claimed to not remember having ordered those particular trees, it was the look of bewilderment that gave Jason pause.

“I should keep them, then.”

“Let’s look over the bed where they’re going to be planted, and you can tell me where you’d like each of the trees to go. Why don’t we go into the house, and we’ll draw up a plan?”

“All right.” They’d taken a half-dozen steps toward the house when Curtis grabbed Jason by the arm and said, “Say, did you tell me that you bought a lot from Hal Garrity down on River Road?”

“I did. That’s home base for my business now.”

“Did you know that my Sophie is buying the old Walsh place?”

“I believe she already has.”

“Well, then, that makes you neighbors.” Curtis was beaming, as if that were a good thing. Jason supposed that under other circumstances, it would be.

“Yes, it does.”

“I suppose it would be an imposition of me to ask you to keep an eye on her.”

“Excuse me?”

“Young girl out there in that damn-near-abandoned building all by herself. Anything could happen.”

“I think Sophie can take care of herself, Curtis.”

“She thinks she can. Thinks she wants to run a damned restaurant. A restaurant! Wants to be a cook, for all that’s holy! She’s a lawyer, damn it. An Enright lawyer in St. Dennis. That means something. What the hell does it mean to be a cook?”

“I guess you need to ask her that question.”

“I already did. Know what she said? She said that cooking made her happy. I told her that she didn’t know happy until she brought her toughest case before the toughest judge in the state and went up against the nastiest opposing counsel on the Eastern Shore—and won. That’s happiness, boy.”

“Maybe for her, happiness means something else.”

“Know what she’s planning on selling in that place of hers? Quiche. Strawberry salads. Yogurt and granola.
Granola
. Who eats that stuff?” If Jason wasn’t mistaken, Curtis actually huffed. “This is the Chesapeake. We eat crabs and oysters and fish. How is she going to make a living cooking stuff like that?”

“She’ll do okay.”

“And the place is a dump. Have you seen it? Of course you have. You’re right next door there. I have to tell you, that’s the only consolation I have. That you’re right there if she gets into trouble.” Curtis patted Jason on the back. “Now, I got Violet to drive me out there on Sunday afternoon. That place has been boarded up for years and it needs a ton of work. She’s going to go broke fixing it up before she even opens for business.”

Jason wasn’t sure how to respond to that—the place did need a lot of work—so he made no response at all. Instead, he continued walking to the back porch and helped Curtis up the stairs. He got the man into the kitchen, where he poured them both a glass of iced tea from the pitcher Mrs. Anderson had left in the refrigerator.

“She’s a stubborn cuss, that girl is. I tried to talk some sense into her, but I was just wasting my breath.”

“She’ll do okay, Curtis. Sophie’s a smart girl, and I’m sure she has a plan. I wouldn’t worry about her too much.”

Jason kept Curtis talking until he was satisfied that the old man was himself again.

An hour later, the trees each having a designated destination, Jason was driving back up Old St. Mary’s Church Road. At the corner across from the park, he made a left, then parked the car a few doors down from Enright & Enright’s offices. He’d been disturbed by his conversation with Curtis and thought someone in the family should know. He was hoping that someone would be Sophie.

“Hello, Jason.” Violet stood just outside the door of the first office when he entered. “Nice to see you.”

“Hi.” He gave her his best smile. She was, after all, the gatekeeper.

“Are you here to see Jesse?” Before Jason could respond, she added, “He just got back to the office.”

“Ah, well, actually, I …,” Jason began.

“Hey, Jason.” Jesse stepped into the hall. “What’s up?”

“I just wanted a minute, if you have one.” Disappointed, but knowing he couldn’t very well bypass one Enright for the other, especially since the other probably wouldn’t see him anyway, Jason followed Jesse into the office. When the door was closed behind them, Jason said, “I just came from your grandfather’s place.”

“I know you’ve been doing a lot of work there for him. We were over there on Saturday, and love what you’ve done so far. He’s really excited, by the way, and that makes everyone happy. He doesn’t have a lot
to do these days, so it’s good to see him interested in something.”

There was no easy way to say it, so Jason put it out there straight.

“He seems a bit confused today, Jesse.”

“What do you mean, confused?”

Jason repeated the conversation he’d had with Curtis about the trees, then added, “He seemed pretty much himself when I left, but I thought you should know. Maybe stop in on your way home.”

“I’ll do that. Thanks, Jace. We all worry about him living there by himself. If anything should happen, well, he’s pretty much on his own.” He looked across the table and asked, “Did you tell Sophie?”

“Ah, no. I’d just gotten here when I ran into you.”

“She’s in the back office there. Go on back and say hello. She’s been working herself like a dog today. Brooke tells me that a bunch of them went out to give her a hand at her new place, helped her clean, wash stuff up, that sort of thing. Tired as she is, I gotta admit, she’s true to her word. Showed up here at the office at two on the nose and has been working all afternoon on a bunch of cases I have coming up within the next few weeks.” Jesse lowered his voice. “I just hope she can keep it up, you know? I don’t think this is going to be as easy as she thought.”

“I’m sure she knows what’s best for her.” Jason made a point of looking at his watch. “I gotta run. Got an appointment in five minutes on the other side of town, and you know what traffic is like this time of the day. I’ll see you later.”

Jason called goodbye to Violet on his way out the door. He’d heard Sophie’s voice in the hall and couldn’t
leave fast enough. The last thing he wanted was a confrontation with her in front of her brother.

He sat in the cab of his truck for a few moments. This was such a small town, there was no way to avoid running in to her, and no way to avoid having everyone in town find out about their … what to call it? Misunderstanding? Falling out? That would do, he supposed.

He drove home without thinking where he was going. Normally he’d have picked up something for dinner on the way home, but tonight he forgot. It was still early, though. He could call in someplace, maybe have something delivered. There was a stack of take-out menus in a kitchen drawer. He went through them all twice, but nothing appealed to him.

He wished things had gone differently with Sophie, but he couldn’t turn back the clock. He wished he’d been able to be happy for her that she got what she wanted, wished that he hadn’t wanted the same thing. He wished he could call her and meet her for dinner to celebrate her new venture. Wished he could bring her back here and talk her into staying the night. Wished he could wake up in the morning and spend a little time watching her sleep.

Wished he knew how to take things back to the way they were just one short week ago.

Chapter 22