Secrets (26 page)

Guests were not ogres with knowing eyes. This was a fresh start. She wasn’t labeled here; neither was Star. They were not the Looney Toons anymore.

She chose the final pictures, wrote the descriptions, completed the cost and reservation page. Work helped. It kept her mind busy. It was always good to have her mind too busy to wander. Unguarded moments were too hard to control.

She clenched her fists. What did that have to do with Web sites and inns? Nothing.
So stop thinking that way. It’s going to be fine. It will all work out
.

She expelled a long breath, clicked the print command, then snatched the papers and hurried out to the carriage house. Star was gone, but even if she was there, Rese would have headed for Lance first. He was more involved with the business; the whole food plan was his idea. It was not affirmation she needed, just…

Baxter came and pranced at her side, his expression saying that he deserved whatever love she lavished on him with no performance on his part except to lap it up. She laughed and wrapped him in her arms as he licked her throat and chin, then stood up before his tail demolished the pages.

Lance had the front of the carriage house closed in with French doors and panel windows, but the doors stood open to dissipate the paint fumes as he worked. When she walked in, he said, “Pretty soon you’ll have to knock.”

She hadn’t thought in those terms, but he was right. It was almost his space. She held the copied sheets out.

“What’s this?” He set the roller down and took them.

“Web site up and operational.” Her one college course on Web page design had taught her what she needed in order to create the site for Barretts, Inc. That site had been good, showing examples of the places they had renovated, before and after shots, and close-ups of banister detail, cabinet work, and her carvings. But this site was better. She refused to think it was because Lance was in it.

He glanced through the pages. “Good work. It captures the place well.”

His words sank like well-placed nails, straight, tight, and effective. “There’s even music on the home page. And look.” She surprised him with Baxter’s photo.

“Now there’s a sell.” He hadn’t commented on his own pictures. He handed the pages back and smiled. “That’s great, Rese.”

A smooth hand rubbing in the finish. Okay, she’d wanted his approval. It felt good, even if she didn’t need it. She turned and studied his progress from inside. With the white walls, the place felt open and bright in spite of the limited windows. “The skylights were a good idea. Even if you shade the front windows for privacy, you’ll have daylight.”

“Mmhmm.” He rubbed a line of paint from his thumb onto a rag.

She peeked into the bathroom. He had grouted the floor, and there was no sign of the rock structure beneath. She turned back to him. “You don’t mind living over a tomb?”

He tossed the rag. “No.”

She couldn’t help thinking how disappointed she’d be if someone built over Dad’s grave without any thought of what lay beneath. But then, if Dad was right, and there was nothing after death but flesh returning to dust…. Her forehead squeezed. She shook her head. That was too … senseless.

Because of her encounter?

Her spine turned fuzzy. It always did when she thought of it. The night Mom died, when she had fought sleep with everything she had… there had been someone in her room, urging her to resist, to fight, not to give in. Someone she had trusted. A presence she couldn’t ignore.

Dad had run into the house and carried her out, but he’d only been inside for those moments. So that left two possibilities. Someone supernatural, or the same delusions Mom had known. She shuddered.

“Rese?”

She startled out of her reverie. Lance was going to think her crazy if she kept drifting off. “Yes?”

He had come up beside her. “There’s nothing to worry about. I don’t believe the dead threaten the living.” His words were only half as comforting as the warmth in his eyes.

She swallowed. “What do you believe? I mean about death.”

“You die; you’re judged; you spend eternity with Jesus or without.”

He made it sound obvious, but it wasn’t. Rese frowned. “Does it matter?”

He expelled a short breath. “It matters.”

“Hellfire and all that?”

“I think the torment is forever missing the Lord’s will, and knowing it.”

She searched his face. “But … if you don’t know …”

“He’ll find an open heart.”

Rese’s throat tightened. “You mean He’d find someone who needed him, even if they didn’t know it?” She had imagined maybe an angel in her room, not Jesus himself. That was too much to believe, too impossible—and way too awful. It made her feel a gaping loss and deep, unexplainable fear.

She pulled away, brought the papers up to her chest like a shield. His religion and Mom’s behavior were too close, invisible voices telling you how to live, expecting obedience in hopes of some future peace. She might not like it, but Dad’s way was simpler. She’d rather think of him in the ground than in eternal torment. And if that meant forgetting the one in her room … well, she wasn’t even sure that was real.

Lance watched her go. He hadn’t intended to be featured on her Web site, his part receiving such prominence. It made it seem permanent when all he wanted was to give her a good, solid start so they could both come out ahead. But something else nagged.

What had upset her? Probably grief. If he didn’t know Tony was with the Lord, didn’t believe there was something greater after death, how much harder would the loss be? Rese didn’t seem to believe much of anything, and more than likely it had been the same with her dad. But death was obviously a germane subject. He should have told her it wasn’t a tomb, set her mind at ease.

He had ascertained that there was no opening in the structure underneath his bathroom before he grouted the floor. It extended at least six feet outside the carriage house and probably farther since he hadn’t yet found an end. Once he started on the garden he could explore that without notice. If he found anything dangerous out there, he would tell Rese.

Inside the carriage house was another story. That was his domain. Not technically maybe, but in his mind. With the house renovated and the attic cleaned out, he was running out of possibilities. The only one left to him, it seemed, was whatever lay under his dwelling.

Sybil’s article mentioned hidden wealth that a search of the property had not revealed. Nonna had not specified losing wealth in her letter to Conchessa. She feared losing everything, and it appeared they had. But he sensed it was something specific Nonna needed, now that death had tapped her shoulder. The doctor had as much as said a stroke like hers was a harbinger of worse to come. She might have years still, or not. But the incident had awakened a need kept silent too long.

Lance frowned. In all the years he’d known her, all the hours they’d spent in the kitchen, she had never mentioned Sonoma. She had said a few things about her papa, mostly what he liked to eat and things of little consequence. She had told him he died young, but she had never mentioned murder or Nonno Quillan or hidden treasure.

So much he didn’t know; he almost felt betrayed. He could have done this for her before she was incapacitated. He would have done anything to help her. Why had she kept it quiet until it was too late? The thought jolted him. Not too late. She would recover. Maybe what he found, what he did here, would help her. Maybe the stress of keeping the secret had caused the stroke. Now only he could undo it.

Lance swallowed. He wasn’t the one for the job. Something this important, this momentous—Lance stopped. Tony wasn’t there. He couldn’t hide in his brother’s shadow, couldn’t default to the one who took naturally to heroic deeds and got things right.

Lance’s throat squeezed. He loved Tony. He’d loved him with the same fierce devotion they all had shown. But it wasn’t easy following after him. Tony had taken strides no kid brother could reach. But Nonna needed help, and he was all she had.

He finished with the caulk, then cleaned up in his bathroom. It was ready for the trim work Rese was going to do. He still didn’t like that. He wanted the satisfaction of completing something. The habitat houses had been teamwork. This would have been his.

He glanced toward heaven.
Yeah. I get the message
. Maybe if he ever did accomplish something on his own it would spoil some deep, divine purpose, like his humility. He wiped his hands on his T-shirt and sighed.

Evvy set aside the devotional and studied the blurred outlines of the far wall. Her eyes were unable or unwilling to transition from the close reading to making sense of the paintings and the tapestry bellpull that hung there. The bellpull looked like a figure standing straight and silent, and she wondered which guardian it might be.

“If you’re death, let’s be quick about it.”

The tapestry remained.

“Not today, then? What have I left to do?”

She stroked the small book she had set aside. Oswald Chambers had scolded her again from the pages she’d read year after year. Maybe she hadn’t always done her utmost, but she did seek God’s highest glory. He’d been father, brother, friend, and lover, Lord and Savior through all the high and low points of her life. Now He was simply her destiny, and when He called she would be ready.

Until then, she’d prefer He deal from the straight deck He’d used so far. Even losing James had not been unexpected. She’d known, sending him off at the station, seeing the firm set of his jaw, the cold light in his eyes, that his life would play out in the war. She’d been devastated, but not surprised.

The Lord had not proclaimed His purpose, but neither had He practiced sleight of hand. There was no shell game meant to beguile her eye, to set up false expectations, then eliminate her chances. No, her course was simply laid out beforehand. It would be what it was. She slid into her late morning doze; not much difference between the wakeful and subconscious moments anymore, both a decoupage of memories and dreams. The secret to life was acceptance and trusting that the Lord knew His business.

C
HAPTER
E
IGHTEEN

R
ese slid the dogleg chisel into the wood, curling a sliver up before it. Her favorite part of every renovation was the carvings that made it hers. This one was the decorative piece to fit over the dining room doorway. The room was elegant enough to support the fancywork, and it might play a bigger role in the inn than she had expected. Two meals a day, plus music.

She positioned the tool again. She had penciled in the design, but it came to life when she started cutting. Since the grounds had once been a vineyard, she carved grapes and leaves and curling vines, drawing out the shapes from the heart of the wood, and pouring her own heart in.

Lance came in and looked over her shoulder. He blew lightly under his breath. “Nice.”

She glowed without pausing the tool. Having entered the carving mode, she didn’t want to pull out, even to accept his praise.

“Hungry?”

“I’m working.” She pushed the tool deeper into the wood, making the groove around the leaf, chipping around a stem. Tiny pieces and slivers came away, leaving the design in their place. She had sharpened the leaf and rounded most of the bunch of grapes when Lance slipped a plate onto the table beside her. A round, flat bread with pungent herbs and pale nuts, melting cheese drooping from the sides with crisped edges of thin-sliced ham.

Hunger hit her like a hammer. Rese turned and met his eyes, laughter in the creases, and confidence. Once again he’d demonstrated the effect of his cooking—and his disregard for her schedule and focus. She picked up half the sandwich and bit in, then sank back in her chair as the flavors permeated her concentration. Nothing used to break through it. Now all he had to do was set a plate beside her and she was eating out of his hand. Not good.

“What can I get you to drink?”

“Water.” She wanted nothing to compete with the herb-laden bread, smoky ham, and mellow cheese. “Lance, it’s delicious,” she said when he returned with her glass.

“Good.”

She sensed his satisfaction, pleasure in pleasing her. No wonder it had rankled before when she said nothing. He didn’t want praise. He wanted to know that he had accomplished his goal, carried out his mission of mercy to the stomachs in his charge.