Mr. Write (Sweetwater)

“Mus tek cyeara de root fa heal de tree.” (You need to take care of the root in order to heal the tree.) ~ Gullah Proverb

CHAPTER ONE

IF
her life were a novel, Sarah Barnwell figured this particular chapter must have been written by Stephen King.

T
he dilapidated gray cottage with the rusting tin roof looked like Hell’s gatehouse.  In the watery moonlight, she couldn’t be sure if the path leading up to the sagging porch was comprised of oyster-shells or crushed bones.

She’d
lost her mind, coming back home.  Really, that was all there was to it.

“
It, uh, it’s been empty since Aunt Mildred died last year,” chimed a small voice from beside her. “I kept meaning to get someone over here to clean it up, but… Maybe with some paint…”

The voice trailed off
again, and Sarah closed her eyes.  Maybe she’d lost her mind, agreeing to return to Sweetwater, South Carolina to go into business with her childhood best friend.  But Allie had lost… well, almost everything.

She looked
down into Allison Hawbaker’s familiar face. Framed by wisps of inky hair, it glowed ghostly pale beneath the flickering streetlight.  Along with the faint bruising of exhaustion, there was a smear of mascara beneath her friend’s Crayola-bright blue eyes. In Sarah’s experience, Allie had never appeared less than storybook perfect – vaguely like Snow White, with a houseful of brothers instead of dwarves.

Now s
he resembled a china doll that had been played with carelessly and set back on the shelf.

There’d been a time in Sarah’s life when her world had been a very dark place, save for two little lights of hope: her books and her against-the-odds friendship with the wealthiest girl in
Sweetwater.

It was her love of both that had brought her back to the town she’d sworn to never set foot in again.

“I’m sorry.”  Allie swiped hastily at the tear that spilled quivering onto her cheek.  “The place looks awful.  And the last bookstore in town didn’t make it a year. I don’t know what I was thinking, asking you to come home, take this on.  It’s crazy.”

Maybe. T
here were a lot of changes in the industry that were making the survival of brick and mortar stores – even cheerful ones – precarious. 

But
plenty of people still liked the feel of an actual book in their hands, and there were ways to draw customers in with clever marketing.  Sarah ought to know, as she’d managed an indie retailer up until a couple weeks before she’d left Charleston.   

“
This place has a ton of potential,” she told her friend now, because of course she’d done her homework before agreeing to come back.  Thanks to some rezoning, galleries and boutiques were springing up on what had once been a street filled with decaying southern grandeur and low-end rentals.  What she’d always thought of as Mayberry gone to seed.

“The
new university branch is nearby,” she said. The comfortable seating areas, student discounts and free WIFI she planned would encourage them to meet here.  “We’re close enough to the beaches to get tourists passing through. Then there’s the new office building at the end of the block, and a pharmacy across the street.  Good foot traffic.”  Which was a relief, considering their parking lot was going to be the size of a postage stamp.  “Factor in the coffee and Josie working her magic with the baked goods…”

S
he wrapped her arm around Allie’s thin shoulders.  “It’ll work, Al.” 

As they ascended the
worn stairs, Sarah reminded herself that despite the rather unwelcoming exterior, the inspection had determined that the foundation was sound, the plumbing and electric up to code. And the restroom was already handicapped accessible due to Mildred’s confinement to a wheelchair in her last year of life.  If she was going to be sinking her limited savings into this venture, at least it didn’t have to be on what she thought of as the nuts and bolts. 

The door groan
ed when Allie turned her key. And so did Sarah when her friend flipped on the light.

“Sweet baby Jesus
.” Papered onto every wall and even stenciled on the heart pine floor, the bead board ceiling, was a sea of vines and petals and blooming things as far as the eye could see.  If the outside looked like death, this was life on steroids.

“
Aunt Mildred had a thing for gardening,” Allie said weakly.

“It looks like Laura Ashley threw up.”

“You should have seen it before the Habitat for Humanity guys came and took out all the chintz furniture.”

“I’ll just thank God for s
mall favors.” Sarah began poking around.  Beneath the flora and the dust, the cottage’s floor plan was workable: basically one big empty room, giving way to two bedrooms, the bath, and kitchen.  A covered porch ran across the entire back.  With their mild climate, they could offer al fresco seating much of the year.

“We can use this smaller bedro
om for office space.” She had a big old desk on the moving truck that would just fit beneath the double window.  “I can get Noah to help build some shelves, here for storage, out front for display.”  Sarah’s brother was a charter boat captain by trade, but he took on handyman work whenever tourist business was slow.  “And if we pay for the materials, we can probably bribe him with a lifetime supply of free coffee, get the labor at little to no cost.”

Flipping off the light behind them, Sarah followed Allie toward the
kitchen.

They were going to have to upgrade the hell out of
it, since Josie was planning to do all of the baking on site.  Which meant commercial appliances, a convection oven.  A refrigerator at least twice the size of the Kenmore relic currently shivering and drooling on the black and white tile like a sick dog. 

The air here
smelled musty and dank, so Sarah raised the window over the old farmhouse sink, trying not to notice the spider webs hanging in the corners.

But
the surrounding marble countertops were surprisingly roomy, and the kitchen itself was large, with an eat-in feature that could be converted to more workspace. 

She used the imagination that had gotten her through
an awkward adolescence, looking past the surface flaws to the good, solid bones.  “A lot of this stuff is just cosmetic grunt work.  Painting, stripping paper, refinishing the floors.  We can handle that ourselves.”

Allie made a noise of
disbelief. “Easy for you to say.”

“Come on, Al.  Anyone who can co-chair a Historical Society luncheon with Carolann Frye without stabbing her with a swizzle stick can surely learn to wield a paintbrush.” 

Allie’s
bow lips quivered into a smile as she considered their former prom queen.  “There is that.” 

Sarah
peered through the gathering dark.  The garden, what she could see of it, was so overgrown that it could have come straight out of Robinson Crusoe.  But if they could get it cleaned out, cleaned up, it would make a spectacular addition to that al fresco seating.

Through the tangled mass of stalks and blooms,
the deeper shadow of a small building loomed.  “You said the garden shed has plumbing and electricity?”

“A sink
, a small refrigerator. Some cabinetry.  Aunt Mildred used it primarily for doing her potting and whatnot. There’s even a small bathroom, such as it is.  But it’s not much.”

She wouldn’t need much, given the amount of time she’d be spending at the store
to get it up and running.  And converting the shed into a living space wouldn’t eat into her capital the way rent would.  Even in Sweetwater, a roof over your head didn’t come cheap.

“I would love
for you to stay with me,” Allie said.  “But…”

But it just wasn’t possible. 
Considering that Allie’s father was sliding headlong into Alzheimer’s, and she and her brothers – well, two of the three – were circling the wagons, sharing caretaking to keep him in their family’s historic home as long as they could. 

H
er oldest brother practically needed a caretaker himself.

Sarah forced
a smile into her voice.  “Well, the rent’s right, not to mention I’ll have the best commute in town.”

“I don’t know.”  Allie sounded dubious
, and Sarah wondered why she seemed so hesitant.  They’d discussed this from the beginning. 

“Come on
, my little doubting Thomas. Let’s take a look at what I’ve got to work with.” 

H
eadlights flashed through the open window.  Thumping bass emanating from a truck with monster wheels made the glass vibrate against the frame.  The music shut off and a door slammed, after which a very annoyed dog began to bark.

Curious,
Sarah watched several lights blink on next door.  She recalled the bone white, two-story antebellum from childhood.  Big and deserted, with its many darkened windows staring back like empty eyes, it had been the house kids dared each other to break into Halloween night.

I
t was no longer deserted, but Sarah decided she still wouldn’t want to go over there for a cup of sugar. 

She glanced over her shoulder to
find Allie chewing her lip, a sure sign of trouble.  “Something I should know, Al?”

“
The renters next door are a little… volatile.”

“Volatile how?”

Discordant voices rose into the night.  Something crashed, the sound sharp and jolting, and another barking dog joined the first.  When a door banged again, the argument spilled outside.

“
Well… Will said they’ve been giving the department problems.”

Ah, yes.  Allie’s older brother.  The black sheep, blue collar job-holding Hawbaker
, and the current Chief of Police.  The shouting and barking both cranked up. “What kind of problems?”

“D
isturbing the peace, mostly.  He hoped they’d be evicted by now, but so far Pettigrew doesn’t seem to care.”

“Pettigrew.” 
The name tasted bitter on her tongue. Sarah figured she should have guessed.  If Sweetwater was a circle of hell, then Carlton T. Pettigrew was its resident devil.  The old bastard owned half the town, and more than a few of the souls in it.

He had, in fact, owned the house Sarah lived
in as a child.  Lived, anyway, until her mother got sick and her father missed a couple payments.  Then he’d had no problem with kicking
them
out.

Allie laid a hand on Sarah’s arm. 
“I don’t know how to say this, so I’m just going to make it quick.  It’s Austin, Sarah.  Austin and Jonas.” 

Sarah’s
stomach dropped like a stone.  “There are
Linvilles
living next door?”

Allie winced.  “I’m sorry.  I should have told you sooner, but
they didn’t move in until after you’d already given notice at your job.”

Sarah pinched the bridge of her nose
as the two male voices began trading obscenities.  The brothers had always fought like rabid skunks tied up in a sack.  That they still chose to live together suggested they were either gluttons for punishment or just plain stupid.  Sarah was betting on the latter.  They’d been big, mean bullies all of their lives.

She
could still hear Austin calling her Peppermint Fatty before pushing her face into the Sweetwater Elementary School playground dirt.

Years later
, he’d pushed her into that same dirt for other reasons.

Sarah
quickly suppressed that particular memory. 
Ancient history
, she told herself, even as her stomach churned.  Surely, they’d all grown up by now.

A
loud
crack
broke the still evening air.

Her eyes widened on
Allie’s and then she glanced toward the window. “That sounded like a gunshot.”

When another sh
ot rang out, they both screamed and dropped to the floor.  “Are they crazy?  Insane?”  There were
people
on this street.  Sarah’s gaze darted around. “Is there even a working phone in here?”

“I ha
ve my cell.”  Allie fumbled it out of the pocket of her linen slacks. She dialed with a shaking finger, just as another round of verbal fireworks lit off next door.  One of the voices was filled with pain, but at least both of the idiot Linville brothers seemed to be breathing.

But
as Allie gave the emergency dispatcher her name, and a brief rundown of the situation, Sarah considered that that might not be such a plus. 

“You know, Al,
” Sarah mused in what she felt was an admirably even voice. “On second thought, I may want to reconsider those living arrangements.”

Allie
offered her a weak smile.  “I’m sorry, Sarah.  I know this isn’t quite the welcome home you were expecting.”

“
Oh, I don’t know.”  She thought the cordite in the air smelled a lot like brimstone.  “Seems about right to me.”