A Perfect Love

by Lori Copeland

  No, Mike conceded, rubbing his chin, Dana wouldn’t want children for a while. He had considered making a case for Buddy’s departure by claiming a need for the entire carriage house, but even with the space divided there was plenty of room for Buddy’s small apartment and the storage of Mike’s eBay materials. Besides, the entire point of Mike’s new business was to move stock in and out as rapidly as possible. If only one could do the same for brothers-in-law—

  He smiled as a sudden mental picture filled his brain. An eBay ad, complete with a digital picture of Buddy, titled: One worthless brother-in-law, No Reserve, Guaranteed!

  Guaranteed to take up space.

  Guaranteed to eat five meals a day.

  Guaranteed to stick like a burr.

  Bidding begins at $1, so don’t delay!

  Who was he kidding? You could plate Buddy in gold and not get a single bid from anybody who knew him. Dana kept saying he’d change when he found a girl and wanted to settle down, but there was no chance of Buddy finding a girl on Heavenly Daze. The only single girl of marriageable age was Annie Cuvier, but she and the doctor’s son had cast goo-goo eyes at each other all through the Christmas holiday, then they’d gone off to wherever they went when they weren’t visiting the island.

  No, Buddy was going to be his problem, his and Dana’s, until the good Lord sent a miracle. In the meantime, however, Mike was not going to let his profligate brother-in-law get under his skin. He was going to prosper and make something of himself. Now that he had a computer, he was going to make some real money and show Dana that she had married a man who could support her.

  Another e-mail chimed into his mailbox. Mike clicked on it, read that an auction had successfully closed, then clicked on the necessary links to send his standard message.

  “Hello!” he began, “and congratulations on winning this auction! If you’ll send me a money order or electronic payment, I’ll get your beautiful art right out to you.”

  He filled in a few details, clicked “send,” then zipped over to the eBay Web page to check on the list of his auctions. At the moment he had more than one hundred items up for sale, and he tried to keep them balanced so a few ended every day. Otherwise, things got hectic as auctions neared their close, for people always e-mailed him at the last minute with questions and payment details.

  He folded his hands as the page refreshed and he saw that the bid on the Iris print had moved up another five dollars. Wonderful.

  He had been a struggling graphic arts student when he met and married Dana. An Ogunquit girl, she’d been happy to move to Heavenly Daze, and when her mother died a few months after their wedding, Mike had been astounded to learn that Dana and Buddy were heirs to an estate held in trust (apparently the widow Franklin had known that Buddy couldn’t handle any sizable inheritance). The trust fund now provided Buddy and Dana with two thousand dollars a month. The amount wasn’t a fortune, but it did enable the Klackenbushes to live frugally and happily. They worked on the house themselves, Dana earned a small income through the Kid Kare Center, and for three years Mike had been content to help Dana with the school and work on restoring the historic house. He was especially proud of his work on the downstairs bathroom, the one used by all the kids in the day-care center. A septic line problem had limited them to one flush per hour until a few weeks ago, when Mike had rented a rooter and rooted the pipes clean.

  But then he’d been bitten by the Internet auction bug. The first nibble came last summer. He’d been browsing the mercantile’s magazine rack for some new home-improvement material when he spied Vernie working on her computer. She was exploring eBay, the world’s largest Internet auction site, searching for collectible porcelain houses. While Mike watched, Vernie placed a last-instant bid and took a house right from under another bidder’s nose.

  Intoxicated by the adrenaline rush, Mike watched Vernie place another bid, and another, and then he placed a bid himself, on a new pair of binoculars. He lost that auction, but it wasn’t long before he was dropping broad hints about wanting a computer for the Kennebunk Kid Kare Center. After all, computers were educational, Vernie loved hers, and the Grahams were getting one . . .

  He wanted a computer so badly he thought about buying one, wrapping it, and writing “To Mike, From Guess Who?” on the card. But Dana came through, presenting him with a state-of-the-art machine complete with zip drive, nineteen-inch monitor, and rewritable CD drive. After Christmas he set it up in the dining room and sat at the table for three straight days, teaching himself how to work all the bells and whistles.

  Then he got serious about his business. From a wholesaler at www.wholesaleart.com he bought a box of art prints on canvas, and then, after they arrived, he listed each one on eBay, careful to describe each individual picture in glowing terms. By the end of his week as an eBay seller, he had tripled his initial investment, and Dana’s bewildered look turned to pleased surprise.

  Now he was determined to put his profits back into the business, to buy more prints in bulk and resell them for ten and twenty times his investment. Yakov, who had expressed his willingness to help in any way possible, handled the auctions that had closed—he pulled and recorded checks and money orders from the incoming mail, and then rolled and packaged the prints in cardboard mailing tubes. So far, in only their second week of operation, Michael’s Fine Art had brought in more than $1,500 . . . which was probably more than Buddy Franklin had earned in his entire civilian life.

  Mike rubbed hard on his mouth, trying to erase the proud smile that had crept to his lips. A man shouldn’t feel pride, especially when it sprang from comparison to a relative, but he couldn’t help it. Buddy was a wastrel, a do-nothing, a mooch, and a bum. But as long as Dana didn’t insist that Mike involve him in the art-print business when the bank refused his loan, he could stay in the carriage house. After all, he was family.

  The computer flickered for a moment, then a rectangle flashed on the screen, informing Mike that his dial-up connection had been broken. Would he like to redial?

  Confound that phone line! Mike gritted his teeth, then lifted his gaze to the ceiling. Dana had probably picked up the upstairs phone. Having only one phone line had never been a problem before, but now he could see that he would have to have another installed. His business depended upon having a stable and secure Internet connection, so as soon as Dana hung up, he’d call the phone company and arrange for the installation of another line.

  After all, if used for business, it’d be a tax-deductible expense.

  Chapter Four

  Feeling proud and sassy, Tallulah de Cuvier wriggled through the doggy door of Frenchman’s Fairest, then trotted out to the front lawn. Though the air was chilly, the sun shone bright and clean from the east, coloring the sky pink and gold.

  Tallulah sniffed, parsing the scents of wood smoke, humans, and sea birds. Butchie the bulldog had walked here recently, probably to mark the post supporting the historical marker outside Tallulah’s house.

  That dog had never had any manners. He peed in the most obvious places, ate garbage, and had even been known to eat squirrels and sea gulls . . . Tallulah shivered at the thought of such atrocities.

  Sitting on her haunches, she watched the sun as it lifted through a hazy sky, then pricked her ears forward. Ferry time.

  Springing to her feet, she trotted to the dock, where Russell Higgs was washing gadgets in a smelly liquid. Tallulah breathed in a whiff of the stuff in his bucket, then jerked her head back and barked. Russell bent to scratch behind the mutt’s ears. “That’s gasoline, Tallulah. Best keep your nose out of it.”

  With pleasure. She thumped her tail.

  Russell bent lower, and—ahhhhh—continued scratching. “Where’s your buddy Butch this morning?”

  In bed, where the lazy slug spends most of his time. Butch wouldn’t get up early for a side of beef, but me, this ole girl would pile out of her warm box on a nippy January morning for the mere scent of a fresh cruller.

  She gave Russell her
best smile, then lifted her gaze toward the horizon. There was the ferry, right on time. By golly, she was going to Ogunquit and she was going to have a cruller, her first in a month on account of Caleb’s sudden concern for her weight. This morning Caleb had forgotten to latch the doggy door, and Tallulah had made a break for it. She felt as though she’d been in the Betty Ford Cruller Center the last few weeks. She strained to peer over her trimmer backside. Shoot. Her hindquarters didn’t look that much thinner, but she’d rather have the crullers.

  Rising to her feet, she watched Russell bathe little gid-gets and gadgets in the bucket of liquid stink. The handsome lobsterman was nice. On good days he shared his tuna-salad sandwich with her. Other days he walked up to the house to eat lunch with his wife. Those two were real interesting to watch. Always nuzzling and holding paws.

  “So how are you this morning, Tallulah?”

  Ah, Russell had time to do a bit of neighborin’. She stood up on her hind legs, her front paws fanning the air.

  “What’s up, girl? Looking for a treat? You should try my house—I didn’t finish my breakfast. There was so much racket going on I had to get out of there.” The corners of his muzzle drooped.

  Well, he just needed a cruller. That’d fix whatever was ailin’ him.

  Tallulah dropped to all fours and checked on the ferry’s progress. The big boat was moving slowly across the water, cutting through the waves as if it had all the time in the world. Didn’t Captain Stroble know she was hungry?

  “You got a boyfriend, Tallulah?”

  Her head snapped up. Say what?

  Russell grinned and wiped his hands on a cloth. “Surely you have a significant other?”

  Tallulah didn’t think much in life was significant . . . except for crullers.

  Russell grinned at her. “Love is great, ole girl, when it’s going right. When it’s going wrong—well, let’s just say it can be pretty rough. Do you know what I mean?”

  Actually, she didn’t have a clue what he was jabbering about, but she was willing to sympathize.

  Leaping onto the deck of his boat, Russell kept talking. “Babs and I get along great most of the time. I love her and I know she loves me, but living with her folks kinda puts a strain on the relationship.”

  Not knowing what else to do, Tallulah thumped her tail in commiseration.

  “Don’t get me wrong—Floyd and Cleta treat me well. Cleta spoils Barbara more than she should, but I don’t mind. I work long hours, and Barbara would get lonesome if she didn’t have somebody around.” Russell dropped a tool and bent to pick it up, then rested for a moment. “The thing is, Barbara and I need our own place. We need privacy— room to breathe. Cleta’s always there; she makes breakfast, lunch, and supper. If we watch TV anywhere besides our bedroom, we have to watch the TV shows Cleta likes, and we associate with Floyd and Cleta’s friends.” He looked at Tallulah. “For months Cleta nagged me about church on Sunday, and I was grateful to have work as an excuse. Not that I have anything against God or the preacher—I’m on good terms with both, really. But Cleta was driving me nuts, so I took the boat out just . . . well, to be ornery, I guess. But not long ago I realized that being stubborn with family is no way to make a life together.”

  He reached out and scratched Tallulah’s ears. “Some folks would say we’ve got it made. We don’t pay rent; Floyd won’t even hear of us paying for groceries. Cleta and Micah do the cleaning and cooking, so Barbara and I live like royalty.”

  Tallulah tilted her head. Then what’s the beef?

  “I’m not ungrateful; I just want a place of our own. And kids. Maybe a boy, and then a girl.”

  Russell’s voice drifted away, and he looked sad.

  Then Russell reached into a sack, pulled out a cookie, and tossed it toward her. Springing lightly forward, Tallulah caught the treat in her mouth.

  Yummm. Oreos.

  She crunched the cookie. Chocolate-centered Oreos. Oh, bliss!

  “Is that Tallulah?” Dr. Marc came down the hill wearing a lightweight jacket and no hat. The man moved quickly for a guy of eight—well, he was nearly sixty in human years, and the guy hardly ever panted.

  Russell waved. “Morning, Doc!”

  The dock jiggled beneath Tallulah’s paws as the nice doctor stepped onto the rough planking. “Caleb sent me out here to fetch this little lady back into the house.” He put his hands on his hips as he stared at Tallulah. “Thought you’d make the ferry, did you?”

  Oh, cats. Tallulah tucked her tail between her legs. Maybe if she pretended to be repentant, the doctor would feel sorry for her and let her go . . .

  No such luck. His big hand swooped down and caught her around the middle, then lifted her from the dock. Tallulah wriggled her feet, but the doctor had a firm grip on her belly.

  “By the way, Russell,” he said, settling Tallulah against his chest as he turned to face the lobsterman. “I have a leaky faucet I’d like you to look at. It may need a new seal, but I’ve never been good with plumbing.”

  “Sure, Doc, as soon as I get a minute I’ll stop by and fix it for you.” Russell wiped his hands on an oily rag. “I’ve been meaning to have a talk with you anyway.”

  “Oh?” The doctor’s smile faded. “Something wrong?”

  Russell glanced away as a blush crept up his neck. “I don’t think so—but you’d be the one to say.”

  The doctor lifted a brow. “What’s up?”

  Russell appeared to be studying the toes of his boots. “It’s not something a man likes to discuss.”

  “Don’t let modesty stop you. I can assure you, there is nothing I haven’t seen or heard.”

  “It isn’t modesty—it’s just sort of hard to talk about.”

  Tallulah felt her heart do a double beat when the doctor sat down on a box. She turned her eyes toward the horizon, where the ferry was still coming, but the doctor set her on his lap and looped a finger into her collar.

  She sniffed. He didn’t trust her. Imagine that.

  “I came from a large family,” Russell said, stepping closer to the dock. “So I’m used to giving in a lot—I suppose that’s the problem. I give in to Barbara because I love her.”

  “Large family, huh? How many siblings?”

  “Twelve, counting me. Having kids was never a prob- lem in the Higgs household. Trying to keep the numbers down—now, that could be a problem.”

  “You come from around here?”

  “Raised about thirty miles north. I had already graduated when I met Barbara; she was still in high school. We met at a football game. She was kinda shy, bein’ an only child and all, but she had a great sense of humor, and she was able to laugh at herself. I like that in a person.”

  The doctor didn’t answer, but only nodded, encouraging Russell to keep talking. Tallulah wiggled a bit, testing the strength of Dr. Marc’s grip, but he held her tight.

  Russell ran his hand through his hair. “Others don’t know Barbara the way I do—not even her folks. She has a heart of gold, and she isn’t selfish, not like you’d think an only child would be. With other people she’s quiet, but with me, well, she’s Barbara. And I love her to death.”

  “Sounds like you have a good marriage.”

  “The best. Married three years now.” Russell scuffed the toe of his boot on the deck. “The only fly in the ointment is this baby thing.”

  Tallulah heard the doctor take a deep breath. “Baby thing?”

  “Well, you know—we try, but nothing happens. Month after month Barbara comes up barren. Cleta’s not much help, either. She wants to keep Barbara under her thumb, and she knows once Barbara gets pregnant we’ll be looking for a place of our own. She has scared Barbara out of her wits by feeding her all kinds of horror stories about childbirth.”

  “That’s a real shame, and unfair of Cleta. Maybe she doesn’t realize what she’s doing.”

  “Oh, she realizes—you don’t know Cleta the way I do. Barbara is her life and she won’t let go, even though Barbara’s a grown wo
man.”

  Tallulah looked up as the doctor’s voice softened. “Many mothers have a hard time letting their offspring fly the nest.”

  “We’ve tried everything, Doc. Barbara buys these medical books about what to do if you’re not conceiving— why, I’ve even . . .” Russell shifted his weight. “Well, I’ve taken to wearing boxer shorts instead of briefs, but it hasn’t made a difference. A lot more comfortable though.”

  The doctor nodded. “So I’ve heard.”

  “Anyway, I’ve been thinking that the only way to change things is for Barbara to conceive.”

  “Maybe,” the doctor answered, “or you could be opening up a can of worms if Barbara’s not ready to be a mother.”

  “I think she is, but she doesn’t know it. Floyd wants grandchildren; he hints at it occasionally. Cleta would love it if we had a houseful of kids, but only if we were living at the B&B.”

  Slapping his hand on his knee, Dr. Marc smiled. “So— you want to get to the bottom of this mystery and see if you’re causing the problem?”

  The tips of Russell’s ears turned bright red. “I’m not much on going to doctors—”

  “Not many relish the thought, but I think you’re overdue. I know I haven’t seen you since last year when you got that bad case of sun poisoning. And I haven’t ever seen Barbara.”

  Russell nodded. “Doctors scare her.”

  “Well, I promise my examinations are painless. Can you stop by the office Monday afternoon?”

  Russell swallowed. “That soon?”

  “The sooner the better, wouldn’t you say?”

  Russell nodded slowly.

  Leaning closer, Doc whispered, “I give all my patients cherry lollipops.”

  Russell grinned. “Just do what you have to do. I’ll skip the candy.”