The Chesapeake Diaries Series (269 page)

On the way home, Sophie asked, “Violet, what did my grandfather mean when he asked if you dabbled?”

“Oh, that.” She chuckled. “He meant painting, dear. He wanted to know if I still painted.”

“Do you?”

“On occasion.”

“Are you working on anything now?”

“Actually, I dabbled a bit this afternoon.”

“I’d like to see some of your work sometime.”

“Perhaps you shall, dear.” In the darkened front seat, Violet smiled. “Perhaps you shall …”

Chapter 24

After she dropped off Violet, Sophie made the calls to Nick and to Mike, both of whom were relieved to hear that not only was Curtis apparently recovering, but he wouldn’t be returning to the house where he’d lived alone for so many years. It was, everyone agreed, time.

She saved the call to Jason for last. When his voice mail picked up, she left a simple message: “My granddad rallied. It looks as if he’s going to be all right.” She hesitated. “We just wanted you to know and we wanted to thank you again.”

She couldn’t think of anything else to say that would be appropriate, so she disconnected the call. She wanted to say, “Call me. Can we please talk?” But she was afraid that maybe he was okay with the way things ended. Maybe he didn’t want to talk. Maybe he was still angry that she’d bought the property he’d set his heart on.

She changed into short sweatpants and a tee when she got home, then heated up some soup she had in the refrigerator. She was sitting on the back porch
eating when her doorbell rang. Two quick rings. Her brother.

She went inside and let him in.

“I was hoping you hadn’t gone to bed yet.” Jesse looked tired from the long day at the hospital.

“Not for a while. Want some soup?”

“Yeah. I didn’t get dinner and I’m starving.” He walked past her to the kitchen.

“Help yourself.”

He did.

“So what’s up?” She took a seat at the table, and after filling a bowl from a pot on the stove, Jesse sat across from her.

“I just wanted to go over a few things with you.” He took a few spoonfuls of soup before continuing. “Pop wants to write a new will.”

“Go on.”

“Aside from the usual bequests—you, me, Nick, Zoey and Georgia, Uncle Mike and his kids—he wanted to make sure that stuff that’s been in the family for a long time stays in the family. Some pieces of furniture and some of Gramma’s stuff, jewelry and silver and stuff like that. He had a list of who gets what. It’s fair, and I could tell he’s been giving it a lot of thought. I think everyone will be happy with the way he’s distributing things.” He paused to eat a little more.

“It’s good of him to think of all of us.”

“You know how he is about family.”

“He mention Dad?”

Jesse shook his head. “It’s sad, isn’t it? I hope my kids and I never have that kind of distance between us.”

“You’ll make sure that you don’t. You know too
well what it’s like not to have a normal relationship with your father.”

“Do I ever,” he muttered. “Anyway, back to the will. He’s made a few other bequests—to Violet, of course, and to Mrs. Anderson. Oh, and to Jason. He was very particular about what he was leaving Jason.”

Surprised, Sophie put her spoon down. “What’s he giving Jason?”

“Apparently, Pop has some first editions of some plant books that Jason was interested in. He gave me a list of the titles. And he wants Jason to have the greenhouse.”

“That might be a bit strange, once the house is sold and someone else is living there.”

“He wants the estate to pay to move the greenhouse to Jason’s place out on River Road.”

Good
, Sophie thought.
I know just the spot for it
.

“And anyway, the house isn’t being sold,” he went on. “He’s giving the house to St. Dennis.”

Sophie frowned. “How’s that going to work?”

“He’s got it all spelled out. He’s leaving money for maintenance and upkeep, but he’d like the house to be used for tours and for education, maybe to showcase local art or something.”

“What if the town doesn’t want it?”

Jesse grinned. “There’s no provision for that.”

“It could be used as a moneymaker,” she said. “Weddings and meetings and such.”

“Well, that will be up to the town council. By the way, Pop’s doctor came in while I was there, checked him out, ran another EKG. Says he can go home in a few days, once they get him hydrated. Apparently he was dehydrated when they brought him in.”

“I was really afraid we were going to lose him,” Sophie confessed.

“So was I.” Jesse finished his soup, rinsed the bowl and the spoon, and set them on the counter. “Thanks for the snack.”

“You’re welcome.”

She walked him to the door. “You weren’t breaching any confidentiality by telling me about Pop’s will, were you?”

“No, he said I could share it with you. Oh, and he also told me to give you the next two weeks off. He said you were looking gaunt—his word—and that I should give you some time to get things set up at the restaurant. So there you go. Bonus weeks. Use them well.” Jesse stepped outside.

“Shocking,” she laughed. “We both know that he hates the idea, but two weeks off would be awesome. I could really use the time, and frankly, it’s harder than I thought it would be,” she admitted.

“I’m trying really hard not to say ‘told you so.’ ”

“I’ll be fine, once all the physical work is done. It’s just that right now, it’s all a bit overwhelming. Trying to get the place organized and figure out what I can keep and what I should toss and what I need to order and what I can make over.”

“Take the weeks. Get your shit together.” Jesse headed down the sidewalk.

She nodded and leaned on the door frame. “Thanks.”

“Oh, and call me if you need help.” Jesse got into his car, waved, and gave one quick toot on his horn as he drove away.

Sophie watched the taillights disappear, then stood in the doorway for a few minutes, watching the stars
wink overhead. She made a wish on the first one she saw, then closed the door behind her, turned off the lights, and went to bed, thinking that maybe the star didn’t exist that could make her wish come true.

Cameron was waiting for her at the restaurant the next morning, a checklist in his hand. “I heard about Curtis,” he said. “Is everything all right?”

“He’s good. How’d you hear about it so fast?” Sophie unlocked the front door.

“Ellie saw Brooke picking up take-out from the Thai place last night.”

“He’ll be fine. I’ll tell him that you were asking for him.” She turned on the lights. “Thanks for putting the bulbs in so we can see what we’re doing.”

“Yeah, it was pretty dim in here.” He handed her an envelope. “Copies of all your permits, estimates, and my contract are in there. Take some time to look everything over and sign it when you get a chance. Ask if you have any questions. You don’t have to do it right now. I can see you’re antsy to get to work.”

“I just want it all done. Jesse gave me the next two weeks off to try to get ready to open, but I don’t know if even that’s going to be enough time.”

“You won’t need more than that. My guys will be in tomorrow and out by Thursday. You’ll have new windows, nice shiny floors, new bathrooms, and new lighting fixtures and ceiling fans. What’s the story with the appliances?”

“The guy who inspected the cooler and the refrigerator said they both need new compressors, which he can install on Tuesday. Said other than dust on the
coils, things looked pretty good. The stove is okay, just needed some cleaning out of a mouse nest in the oven and a lot of spiders around the burners. The exterminator got rid of everything that had been living in here for the past six years, so right now, I’m the sole occupant.”

“What else do you have to do?”

“I need to order some dishes and some utensils, get my final menu worked out, order supplies, and oh, yes. I’ll need to hire some people. Two waitresses to start, a dishwasher, another cook. Someone to help prep.”

“That going to be enough?”

“We’ll see. I don’t know that business will be all that brisk at first.”

“You might be surprised. A lot of people are talking about it.”

“Let’s hope they do more than talk.”

Cameron left with the promise to return in the morning with a crew to tackle the bathrooms and the new windows. Sophie put a drop cloth on the floor next to the largest wall and opened a can of paint. By four in the afternoon, the entire dining room had been freshly painted and Sophie was envisioning how the enlarged photos in their black frames would look against the pale yellow walls. She washed her brushes off in the deep stainless-steel sink in the kitchen and set them on the counter to dry. Then she walked down to the dock behind the trees and sat on the edge, dangling her feet in the water and watching the swans on the other side. She leaned her head back to catch the sun, and when her hair got too hot, she stood up.

“Break’s over.”

She made a call to Grace Sinclair to place ads in the paper for the employees she thought she’d need to start, and to set up an interview for Wednesday. The preopening publicity would be good to generate interest that, according to Cam, was already starting to build. She made a shopping list of items she’d need for the kitchen and her first week’s food requirements. She called Clay Madison and discussed the amount of eggs and produce he could supply. Then she called three other farmers and sketched out her first week’s menu.

She had almost finished with the lunch specials when she heard activity next door. She went to the window and looked out across the fence. For the first time, she noticed that the smelly piles had gotten smaller. How much smaller might they be by next week, she wondered. If Cameron’s crews were as good as he claimed they were, she could target Friday of the following week as her opening day.

Of course, by then, Jason would probably have had another delivery. The thought of a new pile of stinking mushroom soil a stone’s throw from her side window made her want to cry.

She stepped outside and walked around her building, taking note of the work she still had to do out there. Weeds to pull, volunteer saplings to be cut down, flowers to plant. She walked to the front and was considering how she’d manage to have something growing and blooming by the front door in a week, when a car pulled in behind hers. She turned to look just as a man in dark glasses hopped out of a black BMW.

“Hey! Sophie!” he called merrily.

Christopher?
She blinked.

“Chris?”

“How are you?” He put his arms out as if to hug her, and she took a few steps back.

“What are you doing here?” She ignored both his question and his attempt to touch her.

The thought of him touching her made her cringe.

“I came to see you, to talk to you. I’ve missed you. I can’t stop thinking about you.” He looked around, first at her restaurant, then at the lot next door. “They told me at that coffee place in town that you’d probably be out here. What’s with this place, anyway?” He looked around, obviously unimpressed. “You giving up a legal career to open a café? Here?”

“It’s really none of your business.” She took another step back. “I’m sorry you made the trip, sorry you felt compelled to see me. I can’t imagine what would have possessed you to come all the way out here without even calling. If you had called, I would have saved you from making the drive. I don’t want to see you, I don’t miss you, and I don’t want you here. Please go.”

“Sophie, let’s talk this out. We were good together …”

“No. In retrospect, we weren’t. If we’d been all that good, you wouldn’t have been sleeping with Anita. So I don’t have anything more to say to you. Please leave.”

“At least show me around your new place.” He pointed to the restaurant with no real interest.

“No, Chris, I really, really want you to go.”

“Look, Sophie, just give me a chance …”

Sophie studied his face and the desperate sound of his voice. A gleeful expression spread across her face.

“She dumped you, didn’t she?”

“What? No. Of course not,” Christopher protested. “I just got to thinking …”

“Anita dumped you and you thought you could sweet-talk me into taking you back.”

“Look, Sophie, we had a good thing …”

“Which you screwed up by screwing around. But I don’t hold a grudge. Actually, I should thank you. This”—she pointed to the building behind her—“is the best thing that ever happened to me.”

“So does that mean …?”

“It means I want you to leave. Now, Chris.”

“If we could just sit and talk for a few minutes, if you could let me apologize again. I’ll do anything …”

“Buddy, are you deaf, or are you just stupid?” Jason walked around the fence.

Chris frowned. “Who’s that?” he asked Sophie.

Jason put an arm around Sophie. “Want me to pick him up and toss him into the mulch, babe?”

“That would be nice.” She nodded calmly. “Yes, I think I’d like that.”

Chris looked from Sophie to Jason and back again.

“Seriously, Sophie? You and this … goon …?”

Sophie smiled. “He may be a goon, but he’s my goon.”

“You couldn’t seriously prefer …” Chris pointed to Jason as if he couldn’t bring himself to finish the sentence.