The One Who Stays

by Blake, Toni

  “I hope you’ll be friendlier to him than you were to Beck Grainger,” Meg said offhandedly as she’d wavered between varieties of petunias.

  Standing behind the shop’s counter, her friend had sighed. “Yeah, that was insane, I know. I felt like I was in high school or something.” She rolled her eyes. “I wasn’t good with boys then, either.”

  In a way, it surprised her to hear that. Suzanne was usually so confident. “Well, just try not to be mean. To either of them. Just be your normal self.”

  “It was so easy with Cal.” Her late husband. “That’s what I miss most about him. The ease. Since then, most men have just made me want to shoot them.”

  “I know, but...even the men here?”

  “Well, okay, not most of them. Most of them are married or not particularly attractive. For some reason, the attractive, available ones just make me feel threatened or something. Just by virtue of having the same traits as the last jerkwads who shit all over me.” She shook her head. “That’s why I came here. I didn’t think I’d have to deal with handsome men who made me want to do things with them. And just between you and me, I hope Beck Grainger keeps his distance.”

  “Well, sounds like if the poor man comes anywhere near you again, you’ll inspire him to.”

  Suzanne had shrugged. “A girl can hope.”

  Finishing up, Meg pushed to her feet and peered down on the happy flowers. Petunias had been her grandmother’s favorite annuals. “Always so vibrant,” she would say. “Like happy little trumpets announcing that summer is here.” And so, although she added other types of flowers to the beds and pots and gardens, the lawn and grounds of Summerbrook Inn were thick with petunias every year. In honor of Gran.

  Stepping inside, she made her way to the hall bathroom downstairs to wash the soil off her hands since she hadn’t worn gardening gloves. Life as an innkeeper had long since made her give up on manicures, and she felt closer to the earth—and somehow to Gran—by actually sinking her fingers into the dirt.

  She walked out of the bathroom—and practically collided with Seth as he exited one of the first floor guestrooms. “Oh!” Then pulled up short, then blinked, glancing toward the doorway he’d just passed through. “Were you in...?” She pointed. Because no work was taking place in that part of the house. No work was taking place outside the kitchen, in fact.

  He grinned. “Caught me,” he said. “Heard something fall and sounded like it came from there, so I went to check it out.”

  “Ah.” She tipped her head back. “Did you find anything? Every now and then, Miss Kitty swishes her tail the wrong way and sends something crashing.”

  “Nah—false alarm.” He gave his head a short shake. “Or I misjudged the direction of the noise—maybe that tail swish happened someplace else, so be on the lookout.”

  She smiled. “Will do.” Then motioned back toward the front door. “I have some gardening tools to put away out front, so I’m headed back out.”

  It was probably less than a minute later, though, as she stooped down to collect her trowel and some empty plastic flower trays, that the front screen door slammed and she looked up to see Seth on the front porch and heading her way, carrying a box of some kind.

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “Almost forgot—I actually did find something—just not from a tail swish or in that room. This was under some loose boards in the kitchen, under the linoleum,” he told her.

  “Really?” She squinted to look harder.

  “Guessin’ it’s been there a long time.”

  She blinked, studying the wooden box as he came closer down the front walk. A cigar box. So strange and surprising to know it had been hiding beneath the kitchen floor longer than the linoleum had been there—her whole life. All this time, literally right under her feet, without her knowledge.

  And yet, on second thought, maybe not so strange at all. Maybe it made all the sense in the world, in fact. Especially if she could determine that it had been put there by Gran.

  She took the box, then motioned back toward the porch. “Let’s sit down on the steps.”

  Once there, she cautiously lifted the lid—then smiled, her heart lighting up. Yes, the cigar box had been Gran’s. She could tell by a mere glimpse of the contents. And it actually made her let out a laugh.

  “Something funny in there, darlin’?” Seth asked next to her.

  She shifted her glance to him, then back to the box. “My grandma loved hiding things in this old house,” she told him. “She was famous for sending my sister and me on treasure hunts on rainy days—and sometimes they even led outdoors if the day was nice. We were always finding little gifts and notes tucked here and there—and trust me, there are a million little hiding places.” Then she shook her head, still smiling, happy, feeling connected to Gran. “But I never knew it went back that far, that she’d been hiding things all the way back to when she was a young girl. Or that there were hiding places I’ve never even known about.” She met his gaze again. “Looks like this house has secrets even from me, after all these years.”

  “Dare I ask what was so precious that she hid it away?” her handsome handyman asked.

  “My grandma loved Elvis,” she told Seth, picking up one of the cutout pictures of The King between her fingertips. “But she told me her parents didn’t approve—rock ’n’ roll was new and controversial back then, and the way he moved his hips was considered scandalous.” She let her eyes widen playfully on Seth, then peered back down at the magazine pictures. “So she must have hidden these little pictures just to steal away and look at privately when she could.”

  “Sounds like she was a rebel,” he imparted with a grin.

  The suggestion made Meg chuckle, and she somehow felt a little closer to Gran than ever before—albeit in a slightly sad way—to envision her as a young girl with a secret crush she couldn’t share with the grown-ups in her life.

  Next she reached for a Valentine featuring a cartoon-type puppy holding a big heart in his mouth that said, Be Mine, Valentine. She opened it up and read the inscription: “To the girl I love. J.T.” “This...looks like it’s from my grandfather. They started dating in high school.” It made her laugh a little and tilt her head, though, as she mused aloud, “But...we knew him as John. I think his middle name was Thomas, but I never knew he went by J.T.”

  Then she realized there was another smaller card stuck to the back of it—pulling them apart, she saw that this one was a birthday card, the front showing two white kittens playing with a ball of yarn. Apparently baby animals had always been in vogue in the greeting card world. And she flipped it open—to find an entirely different handwriting than on the other. “To my best girl! Ace.”

  She flinched. Ace? Who the hell was Ace?

  “What’s wrong?” Seth asked.

  She kept staring at it. “This isn’t from my grandfather.” She held up the first one. “This one is. But this other one isn’t.” She shook her head, still studying the words, as if it would somehow make the past clearer.

  “Looks like maybe your grandma had more secrets than just a couple pictures of Elvis,” Seth put forth.

  Meg nodded slowly, still taken aback. “Yes, it does. Though...” She let her brow knit. “Who knows—maybe it wasn’t a secret at all. A girl, even back then, could go out with more than one guy. And I guess grandmothers don’t sit around telling their family about every boy they ever dated. But...it’s interesting to me. To find out she had romances, boyfriends, I never knew about.”

  Next to her, Seth shrugged. “Guess it’s hard to know everything about anybody. Guess every person has their secrets.”

  She met his gaze, wondered if he could read her thoughts. What are yours?

  But he looked away, down at a book in the box—a diary. “Probably find out more about Ace in there.”

  She flattened her lips together, thinking. “
A diary is such a private thing. I don’t know if I should read it.”

  “Ever keep one?” he asked her.

  She shook her head. “Never saw the point. Just a bunch of words no one else will ever read.”

  He cast her a speculative look. “Guess if you read this one, there’d be a point. Maybe there’s stuff in there she’d want you to know.”

  * * *

  “I WAS THINKING of grilling hamburgers tonight—if you’d like to stay.” She’d been waffling about whether to issue the invitation, but she was in the mood to grill again, and something about Seth delivering up lost parts of her grandmother had her feeling grateful...and a little more connected to him as well, mysterious or not.

  It struck her that between him and this Ace character, mysteries suddenly abounded at the Summerbrook Inn.

  He knelt next to his toolbox on the kitchen floor, now bare but for leftover patches of old glue from the linoleum. Despite having picked a color, she’d decided, on his suggestion, to leave the floor bare of stain. He took a moment before replying, but then got to his feet to say, “You’re a generous woman, Meg darlin’, but you don’t have to feed me every meal.”

  His eyes said he thought it was charity. And breakfast—maybe that had been some combination of charity and that urge to take care of someone who might need it. But this was...more selfish. “Maybe I’d like the company,” she said gently. Wondering as the words came out if he would read something into them, think she was growing more open to his pursuit.

  She wasn’t. She really wasn’t.

  Even if the way he was looking at her right now made her a little weak in the knees. Even if something in the scent of his sweat actually turned her on a little.

  When he didn’t reply, she added playfully, “If it’ll make you feel better, I can always deduct it from your pay.”

  It brought a laugh. And a better answer. “Okay, you talked me into it. I’ll have a burger.”

  “Good.”

  “As long as you let me do the grilling.”

  “I know—you’re a grill master.”

  He nodded. “Damn straight, woman—now point me toward the tongs.”

  Half an hour later they sat on the patio eating. She’d again kindled a few flames in the firepit while he’d cooked—and she’d added more corn on the cob to the menu and baked beans from a can that she emptied into a small, shallow pot on the grill. Dusk dropped a shadowy veil over the island that came with the need for a sweater, even next to the fire. But as usual, Seth didn’t seem to notice the chill.

  “I’ve decided I’m going to read it,” she informed him of the diary after they’d finished eating.

  In fact, she hadn’t been able to stop thinking about it since he’d found it. And she’d concluded that he was right—maybe Gran would want someone to know whatever she’d had to say about her life back then. And already it had begun to feel like a rare gift—this opportunity to look at the world through her grandma’s teenage eyes.

  “In fact, I’m going to start tonight. I’m going to curl up in bed with it after you leave.”

  Something in that made Seth chuckle.

  “What’s so funny?” she asked.

  “Nothin’,” he said. “Guess I can just think of better things to be excited about curling up in bed with, darlin’—that’s all.”

  She tilted her head, gave him a look. No wine tonight—they were drinking soda. She’d decided that maybe wine and her didn’t mix if Seth Darden was in the equation. But she still followed the urge to say, “Just when I think you’re done with this topic, that you’re all business—I’m wrong and you’re not.”

  “What topic is that?” he asked, all sly-faced and clearly egging her on.

  “Your...pursuit of me. Or brash flirtation,” she added—in case it was, in fact, only that and she was making too much of it. “Whichever it is.”

  He leaned back in his patio chair, looking relaxed and confident. “Pursuit’s a fair way to describe it.”

  Okay, that answered that.

  Then he grinned. “And I do manage for fairly long stretches, in my personal opinion, to behave at least somewhat professionally with you. But what can I say? You bring out the devil in me.”

  She saw that in his eyes just then—the devil. Seduction. Sex.

  That magnetic chemistry she experienced with him never went completely away when in his presence, but at that moment, it was strong as ever, so strong that she felt locked in place, held down tight, by his eyes. She couldn’t look away. And wasn’t sure she wanted to.

  She felt almost as if she had drunk some wine. Maybe Seth was intoxicating enough without adding alcohol.

  Questions flitted through her mind. How long can this go on? How long can this simmering tension last before...something happens? Before the temptation to be “that woman”—the one who lets herself be seduced, the one who could enjoy a hot fling—made her give in? Could she keep wearing her practical, no-nonsense face all summer—at least at long enough intervals to hold the attraction at bay? Or would there come a moment, like this one, or like the other night, when the pull, the curiosity, the scorching chemistry, would become too great?

  Maybe he was a fallen angel. Maybe his secrets, his mysteries, were bad ones. Maybe, for all she knew, he was dangerous as hell.

  But maybe in the end, none of that would matter. Maybe in the end, the devil in him would win.

  She was torn from her thoughts, from the heat seeming to sear her skin—both from the fire and Seth’s eyes—when a deep, familiar voice cut through the silence.

  “Where are you, Maggie May? Out here?”

  Then the back screen door slammed and Zack was walking toward her—his expression darkening in the firelight when he realized she wasn’t alone.

  CHAPTER NINE

  MEG HAD NEVER been so stunned in her life. Zack never came back this soon. Ever.

  And the scene on the patio looked far different than it was. Well, sort of. It looked like a date—which it wasn’t.

  As she instinctively pushed to her feet, she heard his name spill from her lips. “Zack.”

  And saw the stark confusion still coloring his face. Not much caught Zack Sheppard off guard or left him looking befuddled, but this had. “Um—maybe I should have called first?” The words came out low, with just a hint of sarcasm—but also with the unspoken acknowledgment that, shocked as he was, he didn’t have the right to be angry.

  And maybe Meg took a tiny speck of pleasure in that—but at the same time, she impulsively rushed to explain the situation, which felt extremely awkward all the way around.

  “This is Seth—he’s doing some work around the house. He’s a handyman.”

  Zack’s gray-green eyes flitted from her to Seth, to the fire, then back again to her. “Um, okay.”

  “I invited him to have a burger after a long day of work,” she went on. Thank God there were no wineglasses—for more reasons than one now.

  “Okay,” he said again.

  That was when Seth stood up as well, came forward, and offered Zack his hand. “Seth Darden,” he said. “Good to meet you.”

  Zack hesitated. And Meg wanted to kill him. Seth was trying to do the right thing, be a decent guy, and Zack wouldn’t let him.

  But Seth kept his hand out, even as the cool evening air thickened with tension. Meg’s stomach churned.

  And finally Zack accepted the handshake. Gave a curt nod instead of words.

  But it all still felt just as awkward for the grudging way it was done.

  “Thanks for the burger,” Seth said to Meg, “and I’ll say goodnight. I’ll swing by Fulton’s to pick up the sander tomorrow morning.”

  She nodded. “Goodnight.” And tried to tell him with her eyes that she appreciated everything he was doing—leaving graciously, and validating her explanation through his comment about
renting a sander.

  As Seth disappeared around the corner of the inn on the stone walkway, she thought Zack should feel embarrassed, or apologetic, but she could see he didn’t. And she wondered if he could feel it, too—the chemistry between her and her handyman.

  She didn’t know what to say and they stared at each other for a long, strange moment. Her heart beat too hard. She considered defending herself some more, but why should she? No matter how you sliced it, she’d done nothing wrong.

  Finally he said, “You know you can do what you want, Meg. I’m just caught off guard, that’s all.”

  She let her eyes widen on him. “I know I can do what I want, too, but I’m not doing what you clearly think. I’m getting some help on some things around here, and being nice enough to offer the guy something to eat because he seems a little down on his luck.”

  Zack still looked entirely perplexed by it all. “Where the hell did he even come from?” He gave his head a slight shake.

  “He’s here for the summer, to work.”

  Now it was Zack whose eyes widened. “And you’re just...letting a stranger have the run of the place? Letting him come and go in the house?”

  She tried to give him a little perspective. “I let strangers come and go in the house all summer, Zack.”

  He tilted his head, clearly thinking all this through. Then pointed vaguely in the direction Seth had departed. “Since he seemed to be leaving...he’s not staying here?”

  “No.” She let out a harrumph, tiring quickly of being grilled. “But what if he was? It’s an inn.”

  His critical look implied that she was being foolish. “There’s a big difference between summer vacationers and one lone guy you don’t even know.”

  “I’m capable of handling those types of decisions on my own, thank you very much.”

  He tipped his head back in sarcasm. “Ah—well, sorry I give a shit about your safety.” He stopped, ran a hand back through his wavy hair—then looked at her again, clearly still trying to wrap his head around this. “What on earth is it he’s doing for you?”