by Susan Stoker, Cristin Harber, Cora Seton, Lynn Raye Harris, Kaylea Cross, Katie Reus, Tessa Layne
“The beneficiaries of Mrs. Miller’s estate suddenly decided to list it and someone jumped on it before the news went public. The deal went through this morning. A real estate friend of mine called to tell me. That’s why I’d been trying to reach you last night. I got wind that someone was interested and maybe making an offer, so I wanted to see if you could maybe make a counteroffer or something to prevent the private sale from going through. I never dreamed the deal would go through this fast, and all behind the scenes.”
Wyatt dragged a hand over his face, hit with twin arrows of despair and disbelief. “Are you sure it’s a done deal?”
“Yes. I’m so sorry—”
“Who’s the buyer?”
A tense beat passed. “Wyatt, you can’t—”
No. “Who is it, Piper?” His heart pounded, his fingers clenched around the phone. Panic clawed at him with icy talons. This couldn’t happen. He had to stop it. Undo it somehow.
She sighed. “The name is Austen Sloan and they’re over there now with the real estate agent—”
Wyatt hung up and snatched his keys from the counter.
“What’s going on?” his father asked, pushing to his feet.
“Someone just bought the Miller house out from under me,” he snapped, and stormed out of the cabin, ignoring Grits’s pleading barks as he rushed toward his truck.
Fuck this day. Fuck everything.
No matter what it took, he had to get that house back. It was the only way he had left to redeem himself.
CHAPTER TWO
Austen couldn’t stop smiling as she turned in a circle to take in the “front parlor” in her new house. Her old new house that needed a hell of a lot of work before it was in any kind of condition to live in.
But still. Hers, and it felt so damn good.
This was the first thing she’d had to be excited about since John died two years ago. He would want this for her, a home of her own and a fresh start. It was high time she got on with the rest of her life, and after months of searching, Sugar Hollow seemed the perfect place to do it.
Her real estate agent had just left, leaving Austen to savor the peace and satisfaction of finally having taken this huge, scary step. This day was years in the making, and now that she’d accomplished it, her emotions were mixed. Excitement, a little bit of anxiety, and of course some sadness.
Leaving her friends, her old life and all the memories that came with it had been the second hardest thing she’d ever done, but having found this grand old beauty of a house, she knew it was worth it. The house was a diamond in the rough and she intended to make it sparkle again.
Above her in the center of the eight-foot high ceiling, an antique plaster medallion framed an old light fixture that looked certain to start a fire if any electrical current flowed through its wires. Those were the least of her worries at the moment though, as outlined in detail in the inspector’s report she’d received before closing the deal.
The front parlor was actually in the best shape of any room in the house. All the intricate oak woodwork alone had made her heart beat faster when she’d first come to see the place. Elaborate filigree fretwork ran the length of the arched doorway separating the living room from the entry hall, and the jambs had scrollwork carved into them. She couldn’t wait to work on it.
Sure, there was a lot to be done, even in here. Apart from restoring all the woodwork, she’d have to rip out the old carpets to see if she could salvage the wood floors underneath—why did people always cover up wood floors in grand old houses like this?—and she’d need to repair some of the plaster on the walls and ceiling before she painted them. Still, this room was a fairly simple, manageable project to take on.
The rest of the house…not so much.
And lord, she didn’t even want to think about what she was going to have to do in the basement/cellar. It was definitely the kind of place where slasher movies were filmed, all dark and damp, filled with cobwebs and who knew what else. A part of her was terrified that she might have bitten off more than she could chew with this house, but she pushed it aside. The deal was done, no sense second-guessing herself at this point. She’d just have to tackle the project one room at a time, not get overwhelmed.
Go big or go home, John had always told her.
Well, she’d definitely gone big here, and this was home now, for better or worse. She would never go back to Pennsylvania. There were too many memories there, too many daily reminders of what she’d lost. It wasn’t healthy for her.
The old floorboards creaked under her feet as she walked through to the kitchen, where a mishmash of styles had all been slapped together over the decades. Thin beams of light filtered in between the boards covering the tall windows that overlooked the private backyard, illuminating the dust motes floating through the air.
Every visible surface was caked with a decade worth of dust, the paint was peeling and the electrical and plumbing systems would have to be gutted and redone from scratch. Not to mention she’d also need to put in a brand new HVAC system and new insulation in all the walls.
This grand old lady was in sad shape, and she was just the person to give it the TLC it deserved. She would restore it to its former beauty and then some—while updating it with all the modern conveniences it was lacking now. Underneath all the neglect and grime, this place had good bones. Beautiful ones.
Just standing in it filled her with excitement. She’d been lucky to come across it when she had. Apparently the family estate holding the property had been unwilling to sell it since the previous owner had died. The moment Austen had seen the place she’d fallen in love with it, and had called the agent she’d been in contact with about another property in the Sugar Hollow area.
The woman had called the lawyers responsible for the estate to inquire about its status and found out the estate was willing to sell. When they’d given a number, Austen had offered the full amount right away in cash, wanting to avoid a potential bidding war once word got out that it was for sale. An impulsive move totally unlike her, but as scary as it had been, she knew she’d made the right call. A few days later, the place was hers.
She completed her tour on the upper floor, stopping in each room to make notes of her general plan for it. Seriously, the current state of a few of the rooms scared her. What had the previous owners been thinking, decorating them like that?
The house was literally a time capsule, every decade since the 1880s represented somewhere in the decor. The 1950s-style kitchen was particularly heinous, with its peeling, checkered vinyl floors and mint green cabinets made with some kind of laminate and Formica countertops. The upstairs washroom was straight out of the 60s with a matching pink tub and sink—and not in a good way. It seemed any previous renovations to the house had been cobbled together in a half-assed way that made her inner carpenter shudder in horror.
“Don’t you worry,” she murmured to the house, feeling sorry for the state it was now in. “I’ll fix you up and make you better than new, and I promise to keep all the pretty details that make you so special.” Oh, it would be beautiful when she was done with it.
If her budget and stamina held out long enough to see it through.
At the foot of the grand wooden staircase that led from the foyer to the second floor, she paused to run a hand over the newel post. Hand carved out of oak, its fancy flourishes and scrollwork just begged to be cleaned up and refinished. Painting it white would make the whole space brighter, but she wasn’t sure if she could stomach covering up such lovely grained wood.
Once the boards were removed from the windows, this entire part of the house would be flooded with natural light that would make the woodwork glow. The stained glass details in the transoms and panels on either side of the front door would glow like jewels, throwing shards of colored light onto the hardwood floor she would stain and polish to a high gloss.
Stepping out onto the front porch, which was sagging a little in the center, she pried a board off one of the windows nex
t to the door to get a better look at the glass. Not surprisingly, several panes were cracked and the casements would need to be replaced, plus the stained glass needed to be repaired and re-leaded. The plain windows she could fix herself but the stained glass bits would have to be outsourced.
She added more notes to her list and did a quick estimate. If everything came together in terms of scheduling and she could find good, reliable tradespeople to help her, she might be able to finish everything on budget in six to nine months.
Maybe. Because she was experienced enough to realize that building projects pretty much never ran according to schedule. Or on budget, for that matter. And she had only a tiny amount of wiggle room in her budget.
She turned at the sound of a vehicle coming up her driveway. A white pickup came barreling down the long, tree-bordered drive, its tires kicking up a cloud of dust behind it. A jolt of alarm shot through her when the driver screeched to a stop beside her truck, sending up more dust.
The door flew open and a man jumped out, slamming his door and storming toward her. He was big and around her age, with short dark hair and a beard. What she could see of the right side of his face was scarred pretty badly, and she recognized the swirling pattern mixed with pockmarks as the hallmarks of a blast injury.
She’d never laid eyes on the man before but it was clear he was pissed. Austen almost backed up a step at the look on his face as he stalked toward her, a twinge of fear twisting up her spine. Except she wasn’t the backing down sort.
She stepped to the front of the porch and crossed her arms over her chest, effectively barring his way to the front door as he reached the bottom of the stairs. “Can I help you?” she asked evenly.
He paused there, his jaw working for a moment. A shaft of sunlight bathed the scarred half of his face, illuminating his thick espresso-colored hair and hazel-brown eyes. “You the real estate agent?”
“No. The owner.”
Shock flickered over his face for a moment. “You’re Austen Sloan?”
“That’s right. Is there a problem?” Because he sure as hell looked like he had one.
He crossed his arms over his chest—his very broad chest—mimicking her pose, his feet braced apart. “Yeah, there is.”
She raised her eyebrows and waited, not about to be intimidated by some local asshole. Nine years as a firefighter had taught her many things, one of the most important being not to take men’s shit just because she was a woman. This guy was big and built, but she wasn’t exactly petite and had long ago stopped letting men use their size and attitudes to intimidate her. “And what’s that?”
“There’s been some kind of mistake. I’ve been waiting to buy this place since the former owner passed away. I was supposed to be informed by the estate’s lawyers the moment this house was listed for sale, and I wasn’t.”
She’d been prepared for this, for someone to want to battle her for the house, because according to her agent, people had been asking the estate to sell the house for years. She just hadn’t expected a confrontation so soon. “I don’t know anything about that, but I assure you I bought it fair and square.”
His jaw flexed and she could see the resentment burning in his eyes. “What did you pay for it?”
“None of your business.”
A pause. “I’ll pay you ten percent over the purchase price to sell it to me.”
“No.”
More jaw flexing. “Fifteen.”
“No.” She’d fallen in love with this house, with its charm and character and this wasn’t about money. It was about restoring and building a place for her to love and make a home in. “Listen, Mr…”
“Colebrook,” he answered, an impatient edge to his voice. Tension rolled off his big frame, burned in his eyes. He would have been attractive without that scowl, even with the scars.
“Colebrook,” she acknowledged. “I’m sorry you didn’t get a chance to bid on the house, but it’s mine now. I bought it legally and I’m not interested in selling to you or anyone else. Now have a nice day.” With that she spun around and headed for the front door.
“You don’t understand.”
She almost kept walking. She wanted to, but something about his tone stopped her. Pain.
Reaching for patience, she made herself turn around to face him. “What don’t I understand? My name is on the title and the seller has my money in their bank account. Pretty sure it’s my house.” And it was going to cost her more than twice as much to fix it as it had to buy it.
“This house, this property, has significant…sentimental value for me.”
The way he phrased it, and the way his already deep voice dropped lower when he said it, told her it cost him a lot to admit that. “It does for me too.” John would have loved this place. They’d always wanted to renovate a Victorian house together. This was her chance to live her dream and honor his memory.
Those hazel eyes pinned her in place, burning with frustration and…something that tugged at her. A bleakness she recognized that came from profound loss. “I used to stay here. Have Sunday night suppers in that dining room,” he said, nodding in the direction of the where the room was located. “The family who owned this place meant a lot to me. I’ve had my eye on it since the day Mrs. Miller died, and I’ve been waiting ever since for it to go up for sale.”
Did he think she would change her mind because of that?
He paused, drew a deep breath and seemed to struggle to rein himself in before asking, “How much will it take to buy it off you?”
She got the sense it hadn’t been easy for him to ask that. Her mind was made up though. “It’s not for sale. I’m sorry.” She hadn’t even turned back around yet before he stopped her again.
“What are you intending to do with it?”
Again, his phrasing struck her as odd. He sounded protective of the house, as if he didn’t trust her with it. Maybe he was worried she planned to bulldoze it. “I’m going to fix it up.”
“And then what?”
She was losing patience now. “And then I’m going to live in it.” For starters, anyway.
“You’re going to stay.” His tone dripped with skepticism.
Unless this town is full of assholes like you. “Yes.”
He stood there for a long moment, staring at her. She held that hard gaze, refused to look away or even blink. Then he lowered his arms to his sides and his entire posture seemed etched with defeat. The desperate, almost haunted light in his eyes tugged at her, made her want to make it better somehow.
He pulled out his wallet, took out a business card and held it up. “If you ever decide to sell, will you promise to call me first? It would mean a lot,” he added after a moment.
Dammit, he was making her feel freaking guilty for owning the place, when just five minutes ago she’d been basking in all her excited glory of starting this new chapter of her life. “Fine.” She reached out a hand and stayed where she was, forcing him to climb the stairs to give it to her. His stride had a slight hitch to it.
When he reached the top step she caught another flash of surprise in his eyes as he realized how tall she was. A hair over six feet, putting her at about three inches shorter than him. He was a big man. Sexy, in spite of the scarring and the pissy attitude. Too bad.
He recovered quickly, stopping an arm’s length away. Up close she could see the flecks of amber and green amongst the chocolate-brown in his eyes, and there was something different about his right one. It was subtle, but when she looked closely she could see it wasn’t exactly the same as his left. Given the scarring on the right side of his face, maybe the right eye was a prosthetic.
He held the card out between two long fingers, and raised his eyebrows. “Promise?”
Promise what? Oh, to call him if she ever decided to sell. “I promise,” she told him and took the card, careful not to touch his fingers. Dammit, he smelled good, too. Something clean and masculine, slightly citrusy.
“Thanks.” He took a step back and lo
oked past her through the front door, gazing almost longingly at the interior beyond before meeting her stare once more. “Take good care of her.”
The way he said it, as if he was talking about a lover he’d just lost, made her want to hug him. She knew too well what loss felt like, and was sorry she was responsible for his. “I will.”
The moment he started down the steps she went inside and closed the front door, letting out a deep breath of relief as she rested her back against it. As the sound of his truck’s engine fired to life out in the driveway she read his card.
Wyatt Colebrook, contractor. Military contractor? Construction contractor?
He hadn’t made the most favorable first impression, that was for sure, but she’d damn sure never forget him. Outside, his truck pulled away from the house, the sound of the engine growing fainter as he drove down the driveway.
He might be gone for now, but her gut said this situation with the house was far from over between them.
CHAPTER THREE
A sour sensation churned in Wyatt’s stomach as he drove back home. It felt like he was in a daze. Or a bad dream. “Dammit.”
He couldn’t believe this had happened. How had it happened? Piper was a real estate agent and had promised to let him know the instant she got wind of the Miller place going up for sale. He’d been poised to pounce on it when it did.
Whatever Austen Sloan’s reasons for wanting to keep the house so badly, they couldn’t touch his. That house was the only remaining tangible link to a family he owed an insurmountable debt to. Wyatt had spent a lot of time there over the years, enjoying whatever Mrs. Miller had churned out of her kitchen. She’d been a fantastic cook, and a loving, doting grandmother to her only grandchild.
