The Chesapeake Diaries Series (199 page)

“I doubt anyone would feel the loss.”

“Are you kidding?” Brooke’s eyebrows raised. “Everyone’s intrigued by the city girl who moved to St. Dennis to renovate the home of one of the town’s favorite ladies. Lilly Cavanaugh was very well liked and had an army of friends, and of course, Lynley was a legend. Like a goddess.”

“How do you know I’m a city girl?” Ellie turned the conversation from her mother and Lilly. “Is it that obvious?”

“No, but Jesse said you bought the house through a law firm in New York, so I just assumed …” Brooke confessed.

“I thought maybe my city roots were showing.” Ellie glossed over it. “I did live and work in New York for years.”

“How did you find out about the house being available?” Brooke pulled a chair out from under the table and sat.

“I’d worked with someone who knew someone at the law firm that represented Lynley Sebastian. My friend knew I’d lost my job in a corporate downsizing and had been thinking about investing in a property that might need some work that I could turn over for a profit, so she called me when the firm decided to sell
the place.” Ellie recited the story she’d known she’d need sooner or later.

“Oh, like a handyman’s special. I am addicted to those TV shows where people buy a run-down place, work miracles, then sell and make a killing.”

“I imagine the killings were a little bigger a few years ago.” The teakettle shrieked and Ellie turned it off. “Though everyone says St. Dennis is still a good market.”

Brooke nodded. “Without question. Plus, this house is so wonderful. Spacious and those high ceilings and all those windows and fireplaces.” She sighed. “It’s the house I’d like someday, but I guess there are a lot of people in town who feel that way.”

“I sure hope so, since I’ll be selling it.” Ellie was tempted to add that Cameron O’Connor had first dibs, but she didn’t know Brooke well enough to engage in what could be considered gossip. And for all she knew, Cameron wasn’t broadcasting his interest in the house.

Ellie prepared two cups of tea and placed one in front of Brooke, then took a seat across the table from her.

“So tell me what your plans are for the house.” Brooke blew across the top of her cup to cool the hot tea.

Ellie went over what she had in mind for the downstairs, and they pored over the paint-color brochures briefly, agreeing that a creamy wall color would be perfect in every room on the first floor.

“Except maybe the dining room,” Ellie said. “I really like a little drama in there. Maybe red …”

“Red dining rooms are fabulous.” Brooke turned her wrist to look at her watch. “Oops. My hour is up. Thanks so much for the tea and the conversation and for letting me sit and relax with you for a time. It’s been so nice.” She rose and Ellie did as well.

“Damn, I forgot about your cupcakes.” Ellie made a face. “We should have had them with our tea. I am so not a gracious hostess.”

“I’d have declined anyway, but thanks.” Brooke laughed. “I have to taste a little from each batch to make sure all’s well.”

“Wow. A real hardship job.” Ellie escorted Brooke to the front door.

“The hardship comes in keeping my work product off my hips.”

“You could probably get someone to help you with that.”

“Jesse and Clay are always happy to chow down. But when I’m experimenting with a new flavor, I need a more discerning palate, so I get together with the girls.…” Brooke opened the door and turned. “You’ll have to come to one of my cupcake-tasting nights which are really just an excuse to get together and kill a few bottles of wine. They’re always a good time.”

Before Ellie could respond, Brooke went on.

“Have you been to Scoop yet? One Scoop or Two, the ice-cream shop down near the marina?”

Ellie shook her head. “I saw the sign, but I haven’t been. Is it good?”

“Best ice cream you will ever eat. Steffie MacGregor owns the place and she makes all her own flavors.
She’s been written up in magazines and she’s had ice-cream companies try to lure her away and offers to franchise her stuff.”

“But she’s declined?” When Brooke nodded, Ellie asked, “Why?”

“Because she says all she ever wanted was to live in St. Dennis and make the best ice cream ever and marry the love of her life and raise a family here.”

“How much of that has she done?”

“All of it, except raise the family. She just got married last year—to my brother’s partner in beer—so she’s working on that. Her best friend just had a baby a few months ago and I think it’s inspired Steffie.”

Brooke stepped outside and Ellie followed.

“Seriously, you need to come one night. Everyone’s really friendly. It’s a small group, but a dynamic one. Dallas MacGregor even comes sometimes.”

“Dallas MacGregor? The movie star?”

Brooke nodded. “She used to summer here as a kid, then moved back last year and married her old sweetheart. Who happens to be the brother of the previously mentioned Steffie.” Brooke continued to her car, which she’d parked on the street near the mailbox. “Steffie, to make things even more incestuous, is married to Dallas’s brother, Wade.”

Ellie nodded as if she’d followed, but in truth, she was thinking how drinking wine with a group of local women could be a disaster. Who knew what might slip out? Loose lips and all that.

“I’ll give you a call next time we get together. I promise, you’ll like everyone. They’re just regular girls, like you and me.” Brooke got into her car and turned it on.

“Thanks again for the cupcakes,” Ellie said. “I really appreciate it.”

“Enjoy them.” Brooke made a U-turn in the road and waved as she passed by.

Ellie checked the mailbox and pulled out a handful of junk mail, underneath which sat a plain white envelope with her name neatly printed on the bottom. Through the paper she could feel the shape of a key. Cameron must have dropped it off, she realized, without letting her know he’d been there. She ignored a twinge of disappointment and tried to focus on Brooke’s visit. She’d seemed very sincere and very nice, but Ellie couldn’t help but wonder if she’d stopped by for something more than simply a welcoming gesture. Something like what, Ellie didn’t know. She wasn’t used to small-town life and she wasn’t sure if the visit was exactly as it seemed, or an attempt by someone in the gossip chain to find out more about her purchase of the house. Ellie was pretty confident that Jesse’s lips had remained sealed, as he’d promised. She’d expected as much from him.

Well, if Brooke had been on a mission, she’d learned precious little. And the irony was that Ellie actually learned more from Brooke than Brooke had learned from her.

She walked back to the house, mindful more than ever of its connection to her mother. Ellie’d known that Lynley had spent time here when she was younger, but she’d assumed it had been with her parents. Why, she wondered, had her grandparents sent her mother to live here with a relative? And how long had Lynley stayed?

Unfortunately, it appeared that everyone who would know for certain—everyone directly involved—was gone, and had been gone, for a long time.

It seemed the more she learned about her mother’s life here in St. Dennis, the less she really knew.

Chapter 6

H
aving become increasingly tired of take-out burgers and fried chicken, Ellie resolved to start cooking for herself. Organizing the cupboards had helped galvanize her game plan. The few pots and pans she thought she might need were washed, dried, and back on their respective shelves, the remaining having been delegated to a box which she dragged into the closet by the back door. She doubted any of them would be of interest to Nita, but they could be donated to a thrift shop, if, in fact, St. Dennis had such a thing. She’d have to ask around.

She made a run to the grocery store late in the afternoon, and by seven was happily eating a piece of chicken she’d sautéed, a pile of green beans, and some organic sweet potato fries she found in the frozen food section. For dessert, she tackled one of Brooke’s cupcakes. Deciding which one had been the toughest decision she’d had to make all day.

Nothing at all like my old life
, she reflected as she covered the remaining cupcakes and put them into the refrigerator.
But satisfying in its own way
.

Her corporate world had been a constant round of
meetings, and luncheons and dinners at some of the finest restaurants in Manhattan with Henry, her fiancé. She’d never been without her BlackBerry and spent hours each day sending or responding to e-mails. The view from her home and office windows had been defined by concrete, steel, glass, and a bit of Central Park. There’d been someone to clean her apartment, someone to drive her wherever she wanted to go. Someone to shop for her food, prepare, and serve it to her. A personal assistant to handle all those little details of life she hadn’t time for: making her appointments, paying her bills, buying gifts for the significant people in her life, making her travel arrangements.

With her father’s downfall, all of those people had vanished from her life like vapors, as if they’d never really existed, like her beautiful apartment on Mahattan’s Upper East Side and the family’s homes on Martha’s Vineyard, in East Hampton and Vail, the town house in London, and the house she and Henry had bought two years ago on Martha’s Vineyard. Her father’s Greek island had been the first to go.

Sitting in the quiet of what had been Lilly Cavanaugh’s cozy living room, with the wind picking up off the Bay to rattle the windows every now and then, Ellie wondered if she’d been better off then than she was now. The contrast between her former and present lives was about as stark as it could be, and yet, with almost a year between her and the worst days of her life, she reflected on how much of that other life she really missed.

She studied her fingernails. In the old days, she’d never gone more than five days between manicures. Now she was hard-pressed to remember when those
nails had last been polished. Chipped and filed down with an emery board she’d picked up at the market, they were nails she barely recognized as her own.

Back then, she rarely gave much thought to money, because it was never an issue. From lunch to cars, jewelry, and homes, whatever she needed was always available. These days, she had to watch the price of everything she bought, and often found herself not buying at all.

And then there was Henry.

Henry, whom she’d loved, whom she’d planned on marrying and spending the rest of her life with. Ellis had thought that he’d loved her, too, until the house of cards he’d helped her father to build imploded. It hadn’t taken Ellie long to realize that what Henry really loved was the media tag “the son Clifford Chapman never had.” Even now, the truth still caused her cheeks to burn.

If she had to choose between then and there, here and now, would she go back to her old life? Well, maybe to the time when her mother was still alive, so that she could ask all those questions she wished she’d asked back then. And only if she could change things, like have her father develop a conscience and be something other than a criminal.

Other than those few things, given the choice, she just might choose to stay where she was.

While filled with ease and luxury, her entire life up until now had been built on fraud and lies. Since she arrived in St. Dennis, she’d done nothing but work. She’d had to learn to do things she’d never done because there’d always been someone else to do them for her. She had aches and pains in places she hadn’t
realized she had muscles or nerve endings, and yet she felt more alive here than she had in a long time.

At least what I’m doing now isn’t hurting anyone. At least here life is more honest, and when someone offers you a hand in friendship, it isn’t because they want something from you or are trying to figure out how to use you
, she told herself. Not that everyone in New York was like that, but most of the people in Ellie’s circle had proven to be disloyal and cowardly when it came to keeping up their friendship. Except, of course, Carly, who on general principles had promptly dropped anyone who’d dropped Ellie.

And at least here, no one pretended to be in love with her.

Her conscience made an attempt to remind her that, these days, she was the one doing the pretending, but she chose to ignore it.

When she laid her head upon her pillow, rather than lie awake worrying about the next day’s meetings or the next press release or media campaign, she fell into a deep sleep within minutes. She’d awaken the next morning as she had every day since she’d been in St. Dennis, not to the shriek of an alarm, but to the sound of branches from an evergreen lightly scraping across the bedroom window, and geese calling as they landed or took off from the nearby marsh.

A loud and eerie
kronk
had awoken her early the previous morning, and she’d sat up in bed, eyes on the window, past which had flown a bird that looked positively Jurassic. When later that day she mentioned it to Linda, the waitress at the Crab Claw, Linda had laughed and said, “Oh, that’s a blue heron. Some have already fled south, but others might stick
around until it gets really cold. If we have a mild winter, a few might hang here straight through the season. As long as they’re still catching fish and the temperatures are still mild, they’ll stay.”

This morning, Ellie took her second cup of coffee—brewed as per Brooke’s instructions in the coffeepot she’d found—and wandered down to the beach before she started work for the day. The sun was bright and strong enough to have warmed the rock she often sat on, and she’d no sooner taken her seat than the heron passed overhead. She watched it land in the marsh and disappear among the reeds. She’d sighed with a contentment she hadn’t expected to feel, sipped the rest of her coffee, and went back to the house to work. After years of having chased herself without even realizing she’d been doing so, she was finding the change of pace refreshing.

The room on today’s list was the dining room. She’d started to dust the furniture two days ago, but organizing the kitchen had been more of a priority. She spent most of the morning polishing the mahogany table, sideboard, and china cupboard. She’d just stood back to admire her work when the doorbell rang.