Pie was a bad-tempered, one-eyed, silky terrier; the latest in a long line of dogs Clancy had fostered in the time Nora had lived there. He’d been due to go back to Playful Paws Puppy Rescue around the time Clancy had passed. But after hearing the news, they’d said it was no rush getting him back.
This wasn’t their first rodeo.
So, she was not only stuck looking after a house that wasn’t hers, but also a dog that didn’t much like her. Which mucked with her head more than she liked. This had better get sorted...and soon.
Nora reached slowly into her tote for the baggie of dried meat she’d picked up at the whole-foods market. “I got you a little treat, Pie. Want some?”
She earned a distant growl for her efforts, before the flap of the doggie door gave her reprieve.
Stepping deeper inside the house, her foot caught on the mail that had been slipped through the mail slot in the front door.
A couple of department store mailers, Clancy’s subscription to Men’s Health magazine—for the articles, she’d always claimed—and an official-looking envelope. The latter was thick and yellow, the Melbourne address of a London law firm etched into the top left corner.
And it was addressed to Nora.
Heart kicking till she felt it in her neck and in a flush across her cheeks, Nora moved to the steep stairs leading up to her first-floor apartment, and sat, popping her tote and new kaftan beside her. Then she opened the envelope without ado.
As expected, it was news of Clancy’s will, as it pertained to one Nora Letterman.
She knew nothing would be left to her; she’d made Clancy promise after the older woman had made noise about leaving her a sideboard she’d admired. Unless it would fit in her rucksack, it would only be a burden. From what Nora could ascertain from the legalese, Clancy had listened. Apart from a few charitable bequests, the house and everything Clancy owned had been left to one Bennett J Hawthorne.
An answer. Finally!
Though while she felt the expected relief, hot on its heels came a wave of uncomfortable tightness in her belly.
Bennett J Hawthorne. Bennett. It had to be Clancy’s adopted grandson who, from the little Nora had gleaned, had lived with Clancy from when he was quite young.
Poor guy. What rotten news. And to find out his adoptive grandmother was gone while so far away. Actually, where was he again?
The dozen odd times his name had come up someone had always changed the subject, so she’d never heard the story behind his adoption. Since mere mention of Bennett had always made Clancy maudlin, which was the opposite of Nora spreading sunshine wherever she went, and in her experience “family” was as often considered a dirty word as not, she’d happily let it be. And never thought more of it.
Now she wished she’d pressed. Just a little.
Rubbing a finger and thumb over her temple, she searched her memory banks for the times she’d heard mention of his name.
Once a month or so, Clancy would answer the phone, her face pinched, her shoulders tight, and she’d quietly take the phone to her bedroom. One of those times Nora had heard Clancy say, “Bennett” just before the bedroom door snicked shut.
Was that it?
Then it hit her.
Bennett. Ben.
Deep into the night, near the end, perhaps even the very last time Clancy had been in any way lucid, she had muttered, “Ben.” Then, louder, more insistent, “Ben? Is that you?”
“Ben? Ben who? Would you like me to find him?” Nora had asked, not realising at the time Clancy had meant Bennett, the prodigal, hush hush adopted grandson. “Ask him to come?”
“No,” Clancy had shot back, her face twisting as if in pain. “Leave him be.”
Leave him be. As if asking a guy to take the time to visit his ailing grandmother was too great a burden.
Nora shifted on the stair, the skinny plank of wood with its threadbare patch of old carpet biting into her backside, her initial feelings of poor guy having morphed into what the heck?
This was the person Clancy had left her beloved Thornfield Hall to? Seriously, what kind of man treated a person that way? Never visiting, calling but rarely. Especially someone as vibrant and loving and wondrous and accepting as Clancy?
Nora allowed herself a rare moment of indulging in feeling all the feelings—the gutting sorrow, the flutters of rage—letting them stew till they coagulated in an ugly ball in her belly before she sucked in a deep soothing breath and reduced them to a simmer.
It took longer than she’d have liked to let it go. But she managed. Letting go of ugly feelings was something she’d long since learned to do with alacrity and grace.
Happiness over suffering.
This was the news she’d been waiting for, unexpected outcome or no. Bennett Hawthorne could come and grab the keys, she’d politely talk him through the vagaries of the old home—the upstairs window that had been painted shut, the noisy downstairs pipe, the wriggly front door lock—then she could draw a nice clean line under what had been a wonderful chapter of her life.
Before the place got its claws into her any deeper. Before this pile of bricks, this street, these people, began to feel like something as insidious and treacherous as home.
Nora lifted the papers in her hand, flipped the page and read on, hoping to find a timeline as to when Hawthorne might finally show up so she could be ready.
But then she reached a section that left her a little stunned, as if she’d been smacked in the side of the head.
While the house would go to Bennett Hawthorne, Clancy’s will also declared that one Nora Letterman, aka The Girl Upstairs, had the right to stay on in the house for a period of up to two months from the date of Clancy’s death.
A cleaner would be paid for by the estate. All upkeep and utilities as well. And Nora was not to pay a cent of rent.
The house was not to be open for inspection, put on the market, or in any way renovated during the time Nora was in residence.
She was—of course—welcome to leave sooner if she desired. But the rooms were hers, for two months, if she needed them.
All of which, apparently, suited Bennett Hawthorne, as the reason the letter was from the Melbourne office of a London law firm was because the guy was London-based and thus would not be able to inspect the property in person any time soon.
“Oh, Clancy.” Nora breathed out audibly, the letter falling to her knee, her gaze lifting to glance into the kitchen.
The kitchen said nothing in return. Though, in the silence, the clackety-clack of tiny doggy claws echoed somewhere in the big empty house.
Clancy knew Nora was a wanderer. They’d often chat about where Nora might end up next; Clancy wistfully sighing over Nora’s stories of camping out on other people’s sofas, slinging coffees in a train station café for a day in order to be able to afford the fare to get her to the next place, as if that life were something to aspire to rather than a case of needs must.
So what had she been thinking, sneaking this into her will?
Nora felt the slightest twinge tugging on her watch-out-ometer, as if she’d somehow found herself swept up in some larger plan. But she quickly shook it off. Clancy didn’t have it in her to be so manipulative. She’d been good, through and through. The best person Nora had ever known. And now she was gone.
“Dammit.” Nora rubbed a hand over her eyes, knees juggling with excess energy as she mentally gathered in all the parts of herself that were threatening to fly off into some emotional whirlwind.
Breaking things down into their simplest forms:
Clancy was simply being kind.
But staying was impossible.
So this Bennett guy had to come back. Now.
Irresponsible or no, on the other side of the world or not, whatever the story, he was one of Clancy’s people. And Clancy never gave up on her people. He’d know what thi
s house meant to his grandmother. And would take care of it.
If not...
While Clancy had loomed large in Nora’s life these past months, had treated her with such kindness, respect, and fierce support, she wasn’t family. So, it was actually none of Nora’s business.
Ignoring the latest twinge that brought on, Nora grabbed her phone and searched for Bennett Hawthorne, but she had no clue what he might look like and, since he was adopted, she couldn’t even look for a similarity to Clancy. A plethora of images and articles popped up, all the same, most regarding the sweet-looking, elderly mayor of some small town in America who’d tried to make it so that dogs could legally marry one another. Ah, algorithms.
Figuring it mattered little—the guy was who he was—she popped her phone away, grabbed the legal letter, took it upstairs, turned her Taylor Swift playlist up nice and loud, and emailed the lawyers.
Copyright © 2021 by Ally Blake
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ISBN-13: 9780369712950
Falling for Her Convenient Groom
Copyright © 2021 by Jennifer F. Stroka
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Falling for Her Convenient Groom Page 18
