Innkeeper's Daughter

by Marie Ferrarella

  “When we all know that you are the one who knows what’s best for the inn,” Cris declared solemnly, suppressing a grin.

  Richard looked from one daughter to the other. He had devoted his life to raising his girls and was experienced enough to know that there was a confrontation in the making. His daughters loved one another, but that didn’t keep them from going at it heatedly.

  He headed the confrontation off before it could get under way.

  Kissing Alex’s forehead, he told her, “I trust you to make the right decisions. Of course, this means we’re going to have to find another general contractor.” He sighed, reminding her that the contractor had originally been called in to make some much needed repairs. Repairs that as of yet hadn’t happened. “If we don’t, then with the first big rain of the season we’ll have an indoor pool in the kitchen, thanks to the fact that the roof has seen much better days.”

  “Why don’t we use the one we had the last time?” Cris proposed. “Mr. Phelps was really nice,” she added.

  Alex looked at her. “Do you remember when the last time was?”

  Thinking for a moment, Cris shrugged. Richard was only too aware that a great deal of life had happened to Cris since then so she couldn’t really be expected to know the answer to that question. “Five, seven years ago?”

  Alex shook her head. “Try ten.”

  “Okay, ten,” Cris acknowledged. “So? What’s the problem?”

  Alex looked at her sister for a long moment. Didn’t Cris think she would have gone back to the other man if that had actually been an option? “Other than the fact that he’s dead, nothing.”

  “Dead?” Cris echoed in surprise. “When did that happen?”

  “Around the same time he stopped breathing, I imagine. Give or take,” Alex replied in the calm voice she used when she was trying to remove herself from a situation. Situations that usually only involved her sisters and came from being one of four kids. Growing up fighting to get an edge over the other three.

  She expected her father to say something to rein her in, but he didn’t. She found that a little odd.

  “Very funny,” Cris retorted, her expression indicating that was exactly what she didn’t think it was.

  Alex ignored her. “Don’t worry, Dad, I’ll find us another general contractor. One who listens to what the inn is trying to say.”

  Richard laughed shortly, but there was no humor in the sound. Alex picked up on it instantly.

  “I’d settle for a contractor who doesn’t charge an arm and a leg,” her father said.

  “No body limbs, just reasonable rates. Got it,” Alex promised with a wink.

  Cris glanced at the oversize watch on her wrist. It was large and bulky and made her seem even smaller and more fragile than she was. The only time she ever took it off was when she showered.

  The watch chastened Alex and she regretted what she’d said to Cris. The watch had belonged to Mike. It was the last thing he’d given her before he’d left, saying that every time she looked at it, she should think of him and know that he was that much closer to coming home.

  Except that he wasn’t and he didn’t.

  Mike’s unit had been called up and, just like that, he had been deployed to Iraq. He’d been there less than a week when a roadside bomb took him away from her permanently.

  He’d died before he’d ever been able to hold his newborn son in his arms.

  “Looks like I’m out of time,” Cris murmured. She raised her deep blue eyes to look at Alex. “Looks like you get your wish, big sister. I’m out of here.”

  “No, wait.” Richard held up his hand like an old-fashioned policeman charged with directing the flow of traffic.

  “Sure,” Cris answered after exchanging a look with Alex. Alex saw by her sister’s expression that Cris had no more of a clue what was going on than she did. “Carlos can watch Ricky a few more minutes,” she said, referring to the busboy who also helped out in the kitchen when things got a little too hectic at the inn. “What’s up, Dad?”

  “I came in to tell you girls that...” Richard hesitated and Alex could see that whatever was on his mind was not a subject he found easy to talk about.

  “Well, I’ve got beds to make,” Dorothy said to no one in particular, turning to leave the reception area. She clearly assumed that whatever their dad had to say was intended only for his family.

  But she’d assumed wrong.

  “Stay, please, Dorothy,” Richard requested. “This concerns you, too.”

  “Of course, sir,” Dorothy said politely, staying where she was.

  An uneasy feeling feathered through Alex. “Okay, now you’re scaring me, Dad,” she told him.

  This was the way she’d discovered her father was ill all those years ago. Fortunately his lung cancer was still in the early stages when it had been detected and she had done the research to find an excellent physician who was able to halt the progression of the disease and eventually get her father back on his feet.

  “What’s wrong?” Alex pressed, wanting him to get the information out now.

  “Are you ill, Mr. Roman?” Dorothy asked, in concern and compassion.

  “Dad?” Cris only uttered the single word, obviously too fearful to say any more. Probably, thought Alex, too afraid that if she said anything more out loud, it would come into being.

  Apparently realizing how his request for their attention must have sounded to them, Richard was quick to set their minds at ease, at least about this one point.

  “Oh, no, this doesn’t have anything to do with me. At least, not in the way you might think. Although...”

  As long as her father’s cancer hadn’t returned, she could handle anything else, Alex thought. Rolling her eyes dramatically, she said, “Dad, you are really, really bad at breaking news to people, you know that?” She shook her head. “C’mon, out with it.”

  He suddenly turned to Cris and asked, “Are Stephanie and Andrea around? If it’s all the same with you, I’d really rather only have to say this once.”

  “Okay, back to being scared,” Alex announced, trying to keep the situation light even though she was filled with a sense of foreboding and dread.

  “I’ll go find them,” Dorothy volunteered.

  But Alex was already on the inn’s conference line, calling both her younger sisters’ cell phones—something neither girl was ever without except, possibly, in the shower and not always then. She was convinced that Andy was hermetically sealed to hers.

  “Stevi, Andy, Dad wants to see us at the reception desk. Now.” It wasn’t a request, it was an order, issued with an undercurrent of fear.

  “Anyone ever tell you you make a great dictator?” Cris asked mildly.

  Ordinarily that might have sparked an exchange that bordered on the lively, but right now, Alex paid no attention to her sister. She was focused on her father, to the exclusion of everything else.

  “Do we get a hint, Dad? A glimmer of a coming attraction while we’re waiting for the two divas to show up?” she prompted.

  “It’s not about me, I promise,” Richard told her with what she assumed was his attempt at a reassuring smile. It didn’t work.

  “Or the inn?” Alex asked, watching her father’s face. Family was exceedingly important to her, but the inn was a close second.

  The next moment she told herself that it couldn’t be about the inn. She handled all the accounts as well as the never-ending piles of paperwork that went along with running the place. She would have known if there was a lean on it or a second mortgage taken out—

  Wouldn’t she?

  She looked uncertainly at her father.

  “Or the inn,” he assured her. Again, he qualified his answer a moment later. “At least, not in the way you mean it.”

  “All right, just how does it concern the inn?” Cris demanded, clearly not able to take another moment of suspense.

  Without meaning to, Richard sighed. He’d left Wyatt sitting in his office. The young man had arriv
ed quietly just a few minutes ago, entering through the gardens and the back door that was always unlocked during daylight hours. Guests hardly ever made use of that entrance, but friends did. And Wyatt was a friend. More like a son, actually. He’d known him since the day the boy had been born.

  “Wyatt has come to see me. He’s just arrived.”

  “Wyatt?” Alex echoed.

  The name brought with it a legion of memories that ran the expanse of two decades and more. Theirs was an ongoing, antagonistic relationship that seemed to be the very embodiment of the war between the sexes—even though he got on well enough with her sisters and they with him. Complicating this was the fact that her heart never failed to skip a couple of beats the first time she saw him each year. Her physical reaction never changed. It was only when her mind kicked in that her behavior returned to normal. Wyatt Taylor was an extremely handsome example of the male gender and it was her misfortune to be attracted to a man she was constantly at odds with the rest of the time he was at the inn.

  “When?” Alex wanted to know. “I didn’t see him come in.”

  She’d never seen her father’s smile look so incredibly sad. “He came in through the back.”

  “Why?” Alex asked. Whatever was bothering her father was tied to Wyatt, she thought. It figured.

  Her sisters got along with Wyatt. For the most part, he was like their big brother. The son her dad never got to have.... She refused to dwell on that.

  Wyatt had been coming to the inn every summer with his father for years. She and the others all fondly thought of Wyatt’s father as Uncle Dan, even though Dan Taylor was no relation to either of their parents. He and their father had been best friends since elementary school.

  Daniel Taylor was an independent journalist who’d traveled the world over, hunting down stories that proved to be too challenging, too elusive for the new breed of reporter. His erratic lifestyle had put a very real strain on his marriage until one summer, Dan found himself divorced and much too far away from the son he adored. So every summer, when he was granted a month’s precious custody, he would bring his son with him to the inn. He came here because his best friend was a single father, too, and was blessed with insight. He came because he wanted Wyatt to have fun with kids his own age, and she and her sisters qualified.

  And above all else, he came to the inn because he practically lived out of his suitcase and had no real place to call home. So for four weeks each summer, Ladera-by-the-Sea Inn became home to Dan and his son. And, by extension, she and her sisters, as well as her father, became Dan’s missing family.

  During the rest of the year, whenever he could, Dan would come to visit and stay a few days or a week—until another assignment would whisk him away. When they were younger, Dan brought gifts from the places he’d visited. As they grew older, Alex realized that the greatest gift the man had brought them was himself.

  “Why isn’t Wyatt out here?” Alex asked.

  Whatever was wrong, she was convinced it had to do with Wyatt. Although for the life of her, she couldn’t begin to guess what it could be.

  “Because I told him to wait,” Richard answered quietly.

  “Why isn’t Uncle Dan with him?” Cris asked suddenly.

  And even as she asked the simple question, Alex knew the answer. She guessed by her sister’s expression that Cris must have known it, too. If they were right, Alex hoped the news didn’t take Cris back to the morning the chaplain and another soldier arrived on the inn’s doorstep to tell her that although Mike was coming home from his mission, it wasn’t the kind of homecoming they’d expected.

  “This is about Uncle Dan, isn’t it?” Cris asked quietly.

  After a beat, her father nodded his head. His eyes followed his two youngest daughters as they walked into the reception area. “Yes,” he said. “It is.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  “UH-OH, THIS HAS the looks of something serious,” Stephanie murmured to Andrea as they walked to the reception desk together. “You know what this is about?” she asked.

  “When do I ever find out anything before you do?” Andy asked, lengthening her stride.

  It was hard to miss the family resemblance, thought Alex, both the one to the other as well as to her and Cris, the older sisters. Approximately the same height, Stephanie and Andrea gave the impression of being tall and willowy, despite the fact that neither was more than five-six. Like her and Cris, both had straight, dark blond hair and captivating, magnetic blue eyes that seemed capable of looking into a person’s soul. At least that’s what everybody always told Alex.

  “What did you do?” Andy asked Stevi.

  “Me? Nothing. Why would you think it’s me?”

  “Well, it’s not me,” Andy said in an impatient whisper. “You called, Queen Bee?” she added to Alex in a louder, cheerful tone.

  Stevi poked her younger sister in the ribs. Alex would agree with Stevi’s silent message—this wasn’t the time to be flippant.

  “What’s going on, Alex?” Andy asked. All traces of her flippant tone were gone.

  “Dad, did something happen to Uncle Dan?” she asked. She wanted an answer, but she wanted to hear the right answer: that Daniel Taylor, the man who’d told her endless stories about places she knew she would never be able to visit, making them all seem so vivid and real to her, was all right. That the man who had just been here a few weeks ago wasn’t here now, the way he always was at the first stroke of summer, because he’d finally met someone special and was taking some well-earned time off with her.

  But the look on her father’s face, the look of a man who was struggling to come to terms with losing part of himself, told her this had nothing to do with any newfound romance.

  Afraid now, not for herself but for her father—and, although she’d never admit it out loud—for Wyatt, the boy she’d grown up with, she gently grasped her father’s arm.

  “Dad?”

  His eldest daughter’s tone said it all—“What is it?” “What happened?” and “How can I help?” all wrapped up in a single word.

  “Pancreatic cancer,” was all Richard trusted himself to say.

  A minute more and maybe he would get better control over his emotions, but right now, those were the only words he was able to utter without breaking down. Dan had told him the moment he’d received the prognosis from his doctor. Come to him and asked him not to tell anyone else, not his daughters, not Wyatt. He didn’t want to see pity marking his last few months, or however long he had. At the same time, he’d wanted an ally to help him maintain his facade—and he wanted his best friend to be prepared.

  Dan’s last visit had been a struggle. His friend had only had a few weeks left to live and he’d looked pale, his step less sure. But it really had seemed as if he was only a little tired. A force like Dan just didn’t die.

  The news of Dan’s death, when it finally came from the attending physician last night, had still managed to hit him with the force of a sledgehammer.

  Richard heard someone gasp and looked up to see that it was Stevi. He reached out to hold her tightly. Of the four of them, she was the most sensitive, the one whose threshold for emotional pain was far too low for her to function well in stressful situations.

  For the most part, they were probably all overprotective of her—even Andy—sometimes keeping things from her rather than subjecting Stevi to undue emotional distress. Stevi had been the one who’d cried for days when their pet hamster had died.

  When their mother had suddenly been taken from them, Stevi had stopped talking for a month. She’d been ten at the time.

  He stepped back, gripped Stevi by the shoulders and studied her to make sure she’d be all right. Then he let her go as he took in the others, coming at last to Alex.

  Alex’s eyes had never left her father’s stricken expression—how could she not have seen that? How could she have missed that pain, that sorrow? It was right there for her to see, she berated herself. What was she, blind?

  “Is he—?
”

  Alex couldn’t get herself to finish the sentence. She could feel her throat closing up, not just in sympathy for her father, but because she really, really loved Uncle Dan. They all did.

  When she’d been very young, she’d had a crush on the man, daydreaming about going off with him to exotic parts unknown. It seemed hopelessly romantic to her to follow stories to wherever they might lead, no matter what the danger. As long as they had each other to lean on for support, things would work out.

  It had irked her at the time that Wyatt looked so much like his father, especially since she and the younger Taylor got along like the proverbial cat and dog. Granted it had been mostly her doing, but that didn’t change the outcome of antagonism. All those summers that Wyatt had spent at the inn, she’d found new and unique ways to torment him so that, somewhere along the line, Wyatt wouldn’t usurp her in her father’s eyes, becoming the son she felt certain he had always secretly longed for.

  Once upon a time, she’d accidentally overheard her father talking to Uncle Dan about having a son. The exact words that had all but burned themselves into her brain had been, You don’t know how very lucky you are to have a son to share things with. To her, there had been longing and a touch of envy in her father’s voice. It said, in effect, that she could never measure up to his having a son. But it didn’t keep her from trying, anyway.

  Her less-than-easygoing past with Wyatt notwithstanding, she knew what it was like to lose a parent, knew the awful pain that caused, and she felt for Wyatt.

  But predominantly she felt for her father.

  Especially now, as she watched him grimly nod his head in response to the question she couldn’t bring herself to complete.

  “Yes,” her father said hoarsely, “he’s gone.”

  “But he was just here,” Andy protested. “How could he die when he was just here?”

  It was Dorothy who draped her arm comfortingly around the twenty-year-old’s slim shoulders and murmured softly, “These things happen.”