The Red Door Inn

by Liz Johnson

  Aretha tugged on Marie’s hand, which she still clasped firmly in her own, leading the way through the narrow maze toward the cash register. Marie barely had time to take in the enormous collection of worn and weathered treasures, each a story in itself. What stories had the ancient Underwood typewriter from the turn of the century put on paper? What ships had the brass compass navigated to safety?

  There was no time to wonder at any of it as Aretha pushed Marie toward a wooden stool at the long counter, then settled onto a matching one beside her. “Hope you don’t mind sitting a spell. My ankles swell when I stand too long.”

  Marie wasn’t sure how to respond, but it didn’t matter. Aretha didn’t give her a chance to do more than shake her head.

  “So your accent sounds like you’re from away. From the Boston States?”

  “Yes.” Pricks swept down Marie’s back as though someone was watching her, and she fought the urge to sweep her gaze around the room. Her father couldn’t possibly have tracked her down already. “How did you know I’m from Boston?”

  Aretha’s laughter tinkled like an afternoon rain on a covered porch. “Oh, honey, us old-timers call all of the United States the Boston States. My daddy called it that, and his daddy too. Not so many of the young ones do anymore, but those of us born and bred in the Maritimes picked it up. Something to do with fishing boats and sailors and trading between the island and Boston.”

  “I see.” She didn’t, but she didn’t think she would, no matter how much Aretha slowed her rapid fire.

  “Where are you staying?”

  Marie pointed over her shoulder, in the direction she hoped was the harbor. “I’m helping . . .” She trailed off, unsure of how to refer to Jack. “A friend. We’re working on his bed-and-breakfast.”

  “The two-story Victorian on the bay?” A quick nod was all the encouragement Aretha needed to dive back in. “Oh, what a beautiful house. It sat empty for well over a year, you know. Such a sad sight with peeling paint and a few broken steps up to the porch. And right along the water. I take my evening walks there. And it was so sad to see it dark every night, no hustle and bustle. Who are the new owners? Is it that handsome young man? The one with the black hair, broad shoulders, and snug T-shirts? I’ve seen him around a bit at the grocery and one time in line at the bank. I said hello, but he only nodded. Seems a sad sort. Is he married? Or are you two . . .”

  Throwing her hand up to stop even the suggestion, Marie said, “Jack—who’s retired and in his seventies—owns the house, and he’s the one turning it into a bed-and-breakfast. I’m just helping him out.”

  “And is Jack married?” The gleam in Aretha’s eye wasn’t altogether innocent.

  Marie jumped to change the subject. “I don’t think so. But the reason I came is to look for quilts. I need to find bedspreads for the guest rooms.”

  Aretha’s smile turned thoughtful, the wrinkles between her eyebrows deepening. “This is an antique store, sweetheart. You can find those reversible feather-filled sets at one of the bedding stores. There are several in Charlottetown.”

  “I know. But I was hoping you might carry something tied to the island. Something made by a local quilter. Something that stands out, sets the bed—and the inn—apart. And I’m looking for some pieces that I could theme an entire room around too.”

  Aretha leaned her elbow on the counter next to a row of flyers about upcoming antique auctions, her gaze roaming from Marie’s eyes down to her tennis shoes and back up again. “A woman who knows what she wants.” Nodding slowly, she continued, “I’m running a little low on bedding, but let’s take a look.”

  4

  Aretha flipped to the fourth hand-crafted quilt hanging from the rack in the back room. She watched the little scrap of a woman run a hand over the blue and green pattern, her finger following the hand-stitched heart pattern as it swung and looped.

  “It’s beautiful.” Marie looked up with a hesitant gaze. “How much is it?”

  “Six fifty.”

  Immediately the delicate hand dropped to her side as Marie shook her head. “I don’t have enough.”

  Aretha hated to break the girl’s heart, but she sold the quilts on consignment for one of PEI’s best quilters and could take no less than the listed price. “Maybe there will be something in your price range at one of the antique auctions later in the season.”

  With a quick nod, Marie said, “Thank you for showing these to me.”

  “My pleasure, dear.” Aretha put the quilts back to rights, and as she did, her hand brushed a sheet of ivory linen.

  “What’s that?”

  She flipped back the bedspreads to show off her only antique sheet set. “I picked this up at an estate sale. It broke everyone’s heart when old Mrs. Donnell passed on and her son decided to sell off all the treasures in her house to pay off his gambling debts. They said she’d embroidered this set of sheets herself right before marrying into the Donnell fortune. I just couldn’t let it pass.”

  Somehow Aretha knew that the girl understood how special these simple sheets were as her eyes grew large and round, and she ran slender fingers over the red needlepoint in the corner of the ivory linens.

  Her lips mouthed the monogrammed letters in turn. R. D. I. The middle letter dipped and swooped, its tail circling and embracing the other two.

  Still running her fingers around the scalloped edges of the fabric, Marie whispered, “This is amazing.”

  “I sell to a lot of tourists, and also to inns in the Canadian Maritimes looking to redecorate. But for some reason I can’t seem to part with these.”

  Marie’s gaze broke away, and she squinted until her beautiful blue eyes almost disappeared. “I’m afraid to ask. How much is the set?”

  “Three hundred and sixty-five for the top sheet and two pillowcases.”

  Her shoulders fell, her face going even more sallow in the dim lights of the shop’s back room.

  It was clear to anyone with a soul that this young woman needed something in her life to go right. And maybe she needed a friend too.

  “I thought you were looking for quilts. Are you looking for sheets as well?” She reached to pat Marie’s shoulder, but stopped just short as the girl twitched it out of reach.

  She sure was a nervous sort.

  “Not really. Jack gave me 225 dollars, but I was hoping to take back some change. Seth already—” She pressed two fingers to her lips, her eyes again wide. But this time she wasn’t lost in the beauty of the embroidery or the silkiness of the fabric. Color pinked high in her cheekbones as she checked herself.

  Leaning in with a wink, Aretha chuckled. “Seth, eh? So, he must be the handsome young man I’ve seen from time to time. And Jack is his . . .”

  “Uncle.”

  Aretha stretched to the side, leaning her elbow on a low-slung table. “And does Uncle Jack have a last name?” His name tasted like fresh clams cooked on the beach.

  Jack suited the man she’d seen only in passing. Strong and simple. Just the way she liked them. There were only so many available men of a certain age on the island. She’d have to be blind not to take note of his full head of silver hair and weather-loved features.

  “Sloane. Jack Sloane.” Marie peeked over her shoulder at the door, clearly looking for an exit. Apparently she didn’t find the only door easily available, so she hunkered down on her stool and swallowed quickly. “But that’s really all I know about him.”

  “All right then. What about this Seth?” As she folded the linen sheets with the red stitching, she winked at the young woman, who didn’t look up from where her fingers gripped the edge of the table. “What should I know about him?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know anything about him.”

  “Well now, I don’t believe that for a minute. You must know something about him. After all, you are sharing a roof, aren’t you?” She tapped her lip and then smoothed a hand over her curls as Marie looked at her own hands like she’d forgotten what to do with them.

&nb
sp; When the girl finally looked up, her eyes shimmered like the sun glistening on the morning’s gentle waves.

  “My word, child. I’m only teasing you.” She grabbed Marie’s hand, refusing to be shrugged off again. The taut skin over elegant fingers quivered inside her grasp. “I didn’t mean any harm.”

  “Of course.” She swiped her free hand down the leg of her jeans before tucking it behind her back, her gaze intent on a point just beyond the rack of quilts but not quite to the wall lined with shelves of antiques waiting to be priced and sold.

  More skittish than a newborn foal and prettier than the sunrise over the bay, this girl was what Aretha’s mother would call a posy, beautiful and fragile. She needed kid gloves and a safe haven. Someone needed to tell that Jack and Seth how to treat a lady like this.

  And if that meant she’d have to drop in for tea, then that’s just what she’d do.

  It couldn’t hurt to meet the most eligible bachelor to arrive on the North Shore in five years.

  And if she could help the poor girl at the same time, well then, all the better.

  Setting the rack back to rights, she nodded toward the front of the store. “Perhaps we should look around for a—what did you call it?—a theme piece.”

  Marie followed her up and down the aisles until they discovered a framed map of PEI from the early twentieth century. The thick black line of railroad tracks ran almost the entire width of the island, winding between streams and inlets, marshes and bluffs. The pinks, yellows, and greens of the map had faded over time, leaving it softened, romantic.

  “Could this find a place in your inn?”

  With a tender touch, Marie traced the intricately designed, brushed silver frame. When she finally spoke, her voice was hushed in wonder. “Oh, I think it would be stunning in the dining room under the chandelier.”

  “Perfect. Then it’s yours. A gift.” Aretha carried it to the front counter, where she could wrap it up.

  By the time Marie reached the other side of the divider, her face was pained. “I can’t accept it.”

  “You said it would fit your dining room, right?”

  “Yes, but it’s too much for a gift.”

  “Nonsense.” She taped two pieces of brown paper around the frame and slid it into a bag. “Consider this a welcome present from one islander to another—with a condition or two.”

  Marie’s mouth dropped open, eyebrows disappearing beneath a curtain of dark bangs. This time the girl wouldn’t miss her wink and accompanying smile.

  “Now you can take all your money back and prove Seth wrong. Am I right?”

  “I—yes. I’m sure. But what conditions?”

  “How about you ask Jack about those quilts and bring him back to see them.”

  “Oh, I’m sure he’d love them. I’ll ask him to stop by as soon as—”

  The squeak of the front door cut her off. Aretha called out a morning greeting to the tourists who walked in, their gait stilted, unsure. With a wave the tall man dismissed her assistance. “We’re just browsing.” Which translated roughly to, “We spent all our money on our bed-and-breakfast.”

  No use looking for a potato in a cornfield. She couldn’t make their money appear no matter how pristine her inventory.

  Holding out the bag with Marie’s map, she leaned in. “Now, tell me more about Jack.”

  Marie picked up speed, her feet matching the rapid intake and exhale of her breath as she clutched the paper-wrapped gift to her chest.

  At least it wasn’t another panic attack. While her lungs worked quickly, they weren’t hindered by the band that always accompanied the unbearable episodes.

  Glancing over her shoulder, she half expected Aretha to run after her, saying she’d made a mistake. The store owner couldn’t possibly give away her inventory. Even if their agreement had included a promise to recommend Aretha’s store for all of the inn’s antique needs. And as many details about Jack as she could come up with.

  It had been too easy.

  Aretha had been too accommodating, too eager to give the piece away.

  How thick were the attached strings?

  Marie stopped just steps from the bakery, and not just because the scent of Caden’s treats demanded to be savored. It would be best to turn around and return the map. Then she’d owe no one anything.

  The sweet aroma of baked cinnamon and apples swooped past her, carried on a gust of wind that rattled barren tree branches, and she shut out everything but the accompanying goose bumps. That fragrance couldn’t be extracted from this moment any more than the ocean could be removed from the island shores.

  Anytime she smelled fresh-baked apple pie or applesauce, she’d return to this spot, to this instant.

  The moment when she turned back, thinking the worst of a woman old enough to be her grandmother, thinking the worst of the world.

  But her only other option was to press forward, to take the gift to Jack and face down Seth’s sour smirk when she returned without the one thing she’d set out to find. But she hadn’t spent a cent. She was coming back with more than just change. She was coming back with all of it. Waving the bills under Seth’s nose might even knock him off his high horse for a minute.

  That was enough to carry her another step and one more after that. And pretty soon she couldn’t even catch a hint of the bakery’s aroma as she pushed open the front door of the inn, slipping from the porch to the foyer to the hideously green dining room.

  As she pressed her hand on the door to the kitchen, a deep voice rang straight through the wooden panels.

  “She can’t stay here.” Seth’s words were anything but unclear, his voice catching on the last word. He was probably pointing adamantly straight through the floor and into the basement apartment.

  “I’m not sure I like this color.” In the style she’d come to expect from Jack even in less than twenty-four hours, he sidestepped Seth’s comment. “Not sure it’s right. Especially for the kitchen. Here. Look at the color sample. Don’t really match, do they?”

  “Jack, be serious for a minute. What do you know about her? How do you know she’s not running a scheme or just trying to get at your money?”

  The older man’s laugh bellowed to the far corners of the house. “What money? I’ve sunk nearly every penny I have into this place.”

  “That’s what I’m talking about. What if she’s trying to make you feel sorry for her?”

  “I already do.”

  Her stomach knotted at a brand-new sensation. No one had ever pitied her before. Envied and imitated? Certainly. But no one felt sorry for the heir to a multimillion-dollar real estate conglomerate.

  Except she wasn’t the heir anymore. She’d given up her rights to all that her name claimed by getting on one bus.

  And that decision had stemmed from eavesdropping on another conversation.

  Seth sighed, probably putting his hands on his hips. “Try to hear what I’m saying, Jack.” His words rang louder and clearer. Had he turned to face the door? “She’s trouble.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I just do. Who shows up out of thin air like that just when you’re about to be a success?”

  “Rose wanted this inn more anything, and I promised her I’d open it. Success isn’t a guarantee.” Jack’s voice cracked. He sure loved Rose.

  “And would Rose want you to lose it all to a pretty hustler with glistening blue eyes and a pert little nose? She’s already been gone long enough to walk to Rusticoville and back again. Three times. Maybe she’s not coming back. Have you checked to see if any valuables are missing?”

  Silence hung heavy on the other side of the door, and she held her breath, suddenly afraid of being discovered. If they found her listening in on their very private conversation, they’d throw her out.

  Nothing good ever came from eavesdropping.

  If she hadn’t stood outside her father’s study with her ear pressed to the door, peering through the crack, she never would have gotten on that bus. She would
n’t have left home at all. And where would she be? Somewhere else she wasn’t wanted. Or at least somewhere she wasn’t loved.

  She’d be in Boston, doing exactly what her father wanted, helping him get his way. He certainly wanted her back there now. That was the only way he could use her situation to blackmail a man she’d never met.

  Pain throbbed at her temples, and she closed her eyes against the building pressure.

  Which was better? Used in Boston? Or unwanted on Prince Edward Island, the home of L. M. Montgomery, the place where her childhood dreams had always begun?

  At least here she was free to leave, to find another place to hide until that ache in her heart began to ease.

  She began to take a tiny step away, but stopped with her foot still six inches off the floor.

  “Rose would have wanted me to take that girl in. She has nowhere else to go. I can see it in her eyes. And I won’t turn her out just because you’re worried that she’ll abscond with two stories of a badly painted, half-renovated bed-and-breakfast.”

  “That’s not what I meant and you know it.” Though his words were no softer, Seth’s tone hummed with a compassion she hadn’t heard in him before. “I’m just worried about you. I want to make sure that Rose’s dream lives on for years and years.”

  Apparently she owed Rose for the roof over her head the night before, but it didn’t mean she had to stick around to accept any more hospitality.

  As she finally stepped back, her foot found the worst groan in the floorboard. Like her weight caused the house to weep, it went on for hours, loud and painful.

  She closed her eyes, wishing that the old boards would open up and swallow her into her basement, where she could pick up her backpack and run until her legs wouldn’t carry her any farther.

  She wasn’t quite so lucky.

  When she opened her eyes, Seth stood before her, eyeing her with more disdain than the day before. She wouldn’t have thought it possible then, but there was no doubt now. The glint in his eyes meant she was in for it.

  His nostrils flared, lips disappearing in his anger.

  “Marie, so glad you’re back.” Jack efficiently cut off Seth’s ire with a quick motion for her to hurry into the kitchen. “I need your advice on this color.” He held up two color swatches, one in a family of orange and the other in the seaweed green clan.