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Charlotte shrugged. “Yes, it is a big risk. But it’s a worthwhile risk. Just the thought of being able to do this up right gives me so much energy. I don’t care if I have to buy shelving instead of shoes. Or stop eating until October.”
“You’re not going to fix up the whole place and decorate it all at once, are you?” Melba turned to a magazine page showing chintz kitchen curtains. “Won’t that cost more than you have?”
“I have to do some of the fixing up as soon as possible. The stove, the heating, the upstairs bathroom—they need renovation before they’ll be usable, and all that stuff has to be done if I’m going to be able to live there. Do I need the designer concrete sink right away? Well, I don’t know yet. It’s probably smarter to get exactly what I want now—once you start ripping stuff out, you might as well do it right the first time rather than rip stuff up again a year later.”
“Charlotte...”
“I know, I know. Stop worrying—I’m not going to take my aggressions out at the home decorating store. I should probably have the home improvement channels blocked off my cable service for now. But since I don’t have a job, I can’t even afford cable television, so that solves that anyway, doesn’t it?” She leaned back in her chair, as if the sheer weight of Melba’s doubts had pushed her there. “This is going to be fine. Really. I won’t let this get out of hand.”
Melba pushed the file back across the table to Charlotte. “Easy to say now, but these things have a way of snowballing. Even the remodeling costs for the house I inherited from Dad sent Clark and me reeling.”
When Melba’s father had died last year after a long battle with Alzheimer’s, it left Clark and Melba to remake her childhood home into the one that now housed her new family. The transition had been complicated and expensive—going beyond what it would have cost in both time and money to start fresh with a new house—but it just proved Charlotte’s point: the house gave off a palpable sense of history. She’d felt something like it from the cottage that first visit. The once-charming cottage seemed to beckon to her, begging to be restored. She knew it was a risky prospect, but she couldn’t make herself feel as if she’d made the wrong choice. She’d chosen a challenging path, yes, but not a wrong one. “I’m going to be fine, Melba. Now let’s drop the subject and let me hold that baby.”
Melba stood up and handed Maria to Charlotte. As Maria snuggled in against her shoulder, Charlotte breathed in the darling scent of baby-girl curls. “You’ve got the best of both worlds, Maria. Your mama’s curls and your daddy’s red hair. You may hate it when you’re five, but guys are gonna follow you like ducklings when you’re seventeen.”
Melba laughed as she warmed Charlotte’s tea and set down a plate of cookies. “Clark’s already informed me Maria will be banned from dating until she’s thirty. And no firefighters.”
Charlotte applied an expression of false shock. “Well, I’ll back him up on the ‘no firefighters’ policy, but that’s kind of a tough sell. He’s the fire chief, isn’t he?”
Sitting back down, Melba laughed again. “I think it’s because he’s chief. He’s seen a little too much of the department’s social life or heard a little too much in the locker room.”
“They don’t seem that rough around the edges to me. As a matter of fact, Jesse Sykes seems like a stand-up guy.” Charlotte could feel Maria softening against her shoulder. Melba was right—the world was always a better place with a baby drooling on your shoulder.
“He’s an original, that’s for sure.” Melba selected a cookie and dunked it in her tea. “I don’t know about stand-up, but he sure stands out. You can trust him, though. He did some of the work here on the house. Good work, if you don’t mind the singing.”
“The what?”
“Jesse has a habit of breaking out in Motown hits. If you haven’t heard him yet, you will. Don’t you remember he sang at Alex and JJ’s wedding?”
“That was Jesse Sykes?” Charlotte recalled a rather impressive version of “My Girl” at her cousin’s wedding. She tried to imagine Jesse’s soulful voice echoing in the cottage living room, but she couldn’t conjure up the image. “Mostly he just made wisecracks when I talked to him this time. Funny guy.”
“Oh, he’s a cutup, that’s for sure. And a good firefighter. Clark wouldn’t put up with his antics otherwise.” Melba got a conniving look on her face. “You should hire him. I think he’d be good for you. An upbeat guy to have around in a tight spot.”
Charlotte narrowed her eyes. “Oh, no, you don’t.”
“Don’t what?” Melba’s innocent blink hid nothing.
Charlotte whispered into Maria’s ear, “Your mama’s getting ideas.”
“I am not.”
“Oh, yes, you are. I know you too well. Look, I know we were discussing behavior, not profession, but he’s a fireman, Melba. I won’t get into a relationship with a first responder no matter how well behaved. We’ve been through this how many times? Nothing’s changed. I’ve got way too many memories of sitting up nights with Mom at the kitchen table.”
“Your dad was a policeman, I know, but—”
“But nothing. Same stress, different uniform. Melba, I’ve got nothing against you and Clark, and goodness knows JJ’s done terrific at the firehouse, but I know what I can handle and what I can’t. I’ve never dated someone who does that kind of work and I don’t plan to start now.”
* * *
A tiny war was going on in Jesse’s chest—and in his pride—as he walked up the overgrown sidewalk to Charlotte’s cottage Sunday morning. This was supposed to be his cottage. The place needed loads of work, and he knew he was the best man to complete it. He’d planned the rehab of this place a dozen times, imagining living in the home as he upgraded fixtures, appliances and wiring until he could turn around and sell it for a tidy profit. Or even stay there and use it as the showcase for what he could do with other properties. But that opportunity was lost now.
The only opportunity left in this situation was to be the guy hired for the renovation job. If a woman could afford a vacation cottage at Charlotte’s age, she probably wouldn’t haggle over the cost the place would require to be done up right. His business sense knew that made her an excellent customer even if she was a thorn in his side. The house needed loads of work, and loads of work could mean a big check for Mondale and for him. As he lay in bed last night, Jesse told himself a job this size could leave him with even more funds than he’d anticipated making over the summer. Funds to buy another house—bigger and better to soothe his wounded pride and show his father just how savvy a businessman he could be.
All this should have had him dreaming up the perfect sales pitch as he approached the door—and yet for some reason, he wasn’t. He prided himself on knowing how to optimize a customer with deep pockets, only Charlotte Taylor didn’t have that entitled look about her. In fact, she looked a little...lost. The way he’d looked when he’d first put on the bulky, cumbersome firefighter’s gear—right at the launch of a dream, forcing an outer confidence that didn’t quite cover the dazzled and doubtful person on the inside.
As he pushed the rusty doorbell button, Jesse still wasn’t sure how he was going to play it for this meeting. Just wing it, he told himself. You wing it all the time. He pushed the button again, listening for the chimes inside the house once he noticed the living room window was open to his left.
No sound. Sometimes it was useful to start a customer off with a small project, but he’d planned on something larger than a broken doorbell. He knocked on the door loudly and leaned over the wrought-iron railing to yell into the window. “Charlotte!”
A second knock and another yell produced no reply. He pivoted to see her little blue car wasn’t in the cottage drive. Maybe church ran long today. He could just start without her while he waited. After checking his watch, Jesse pulled out his notes.
He’d already made his own list of what the house needed, but he’d go through the process of re-creating a list to suit her taste. He just hoped it wouldn’t clash with the character of the house he saw so clearly. Catering to a client’s whims was one thing—ignoring his own clear ideas on this particular place was going to be quite another. Still, he’d do it to rack up enough funds to move forward. He was bone-tired of delays and detours, not to mention his father’s ever-increasing digs.
Pacing the cottage’s front stoop, he toed boards and pushed harder on the railing only to have it creak and pull out from its mountings. He added the doorbell and railing to his handwritten list and began scanning the front of the house for anything he’d missed.
He’d added four more items by the time Charlotte’s small blue hatchback pulled into the drive behind his large brown pickup.
“Sorry!” she called, breathless and airy in a blue print dress with a lacy sweater that rippled behind her as she came up the steps. “Church went on forever. I mean, a good forever, but enough to make me late. I hope you weren’t waiting long.”
Jesse waited for her to say something like “I noticed you weren’t in church.” Or “Have you ever gone?” or the half dozen other thinly disguised recommendations he got from Melba, Clark and various other friends around town. “No, I’m fine. Hey, JJ told me you’re her cousin. You were at the wedding, too, weren’t you? On the boat?”
“Wedding of the year, wasn’t it?”
As the only female firefighter in Gordon Falls, JJ Cushman stuck out already before her legendary wedding to Alex Cushman on a steamboat on the Gordon River. “A big shindig, that’s for sure.”
“And then there’s my other cousin, JJ’s brother, Max.” She fished for her keys and wrestled the old door lock open. “And Melba’s baby is my new goddaughter. I know lots of people in Gordon Falls.”
They walked through the front hallway to the kitchen, where she plunked an enormous tapestry handbag—a vintage artsy-looking thing, he was glad to notice—down on the kitchen counter. “And now I know Karl. You were right. He did give me a slice of pie for my troubles.” She sighed, a happy, shoulder-heaving, contented sigh. “This is a nice town.”
It was, most of the time. “It has its moments.”
Charlotte began digging through the massive bag. “I made a list last night of the things I think the house needs—as a jumping-off point.” She pulled out a notebook with Victorian ladies dancing on the cover. “I’m no expert, though.”
Jesse put a hand to his chest. “That’s okay, because I am. Only there’s an awkward question I really should ask first.”
“Where do I want to hide the bodies?” She didn’t need the pink lipstick to show off that dynamic smile; her eyes lit up with humor.
The joke made the next question easier to ask. “No, what’s your budget?”
“Oh, that.” He couldn’t quite gauge her response.
“I mean, you don’t have to tell me,” he backpedaled, suddenly feeling his poor-loser wounds had run off with his diplomacy, “but it’s better if I know. I can make smarter recommendations if I have a total-figure picture on the whole project.”
Charlotte hoisted herself up to sit on the vacant countertop. “That’s the best part—I don’t have a budget. My grandma left me enough money to do this—at least I’m pretty certain she did. This place was a leap of faith.” She didn’t come out and say “unlimited funds,” but her eyes sure looked as though she was ready to spend. Must be nice to have that kind of cash. Jesse ignored the sharp curl of envy wrapped around his gut.
Instead, he focused on how she fit in the house. Houses—even half-built or long since run-down houses—always had personalities to him. He’d sensed this cottage’s personality way back, and looking at her perched on the counter, he knew her personality absolutely suited the vibe of this place. Had he just finished the remodeling, he’d probably have been delighted to sell it to her. He just couldn’t get there quite yet—for all her charm, Charlotte Taylor was still the agent of the delay in his achieving his dreams.
She looked around the room with wistful eyes. “Mima was amazing.” The grief was still fresh, glistening in her eyes and present in the catch of her words. Whoever this grandmother was, Charlotte missed her very much.
“Did Mima leave you her china?” Jesse wasn’t quite sure what made him ask.
Her eyes went wide; big velvet-brown pools of curiosity. “How did you know?”
“You said you collect.” Jesse began working his way around the kitchen, pulling drawers open, checking cabinet hinges, forcing himself to see the house through her eyes than through his own loss. “It seemed a natural guess that she’d leave you hers if you were that close.”
“We were.” Charlotte’s voice was thick with memory. “Mima was the most astounding woman. She didn’t have an easy life, but she got so much out of every moment, you know?” For a second Jesse worried Charlotte was going to break into tears right there on the countertop, but she just took a deep breath and tucked her hands under her knees. “She’d love this place.”
Needing to lighten the moment, Jesse raised the charred teakettle from its place in the sink. “Even the smoke-signal tea service?”
Charlotte laughed. She had a great laugh—lively and full and light. “She might have liked the drama, but Mima was a coffee drinker. ‘Strong as love and black as night,’ she used to say. Drank four cups a day right up until the end, even when her doctors yelled at her.”
It would be so much easier to begrudge Charlotte the sale if she weren’t so...sweet. Sweet? That wasn’t usually the kind of word he’d use to describe a woman, but it was the one that kept coming to mind with her. Only, she was more than sweet. She had an edge about her. An energy. She was probably more like her Mima than she knew. Spunky, maybe? No, that sounded ridiculous. Vivacious—that was it.
Jesse dragged his mind back to the task at hand. “Let’s walk through the house and identify what needs doing.”
It didn’t take long. Half the needed improvements had already been in his head, and the other half came cascading down upon him as he assumed his contractor’s mind-set and considered the house with her needs in mind. Every time the bitter thought of what he would have wanted threatened to overtake him, he wrote down a dollar figure next to a project to show himself what Charlotte’s business could mean for his future. By the time he left, Jesse was looking at a proposal that might get him down payments on two different investment properties, and she didn’t seem too fazed by it. Things were looking up.
Chapter Four (#ulink_fcc9aeeb-b955-5f5c-b54c-fd131761ac25)
Jesse watched Charlotte reading through his written proposal on her back porch the next afternoon. Despite how easy it was to chat with her—and how unfairly easy she was to like—the entire situation still hung off-kilter and uncomfortable inside him like a bad joke. He admired her enthusiasm, but it felt like a punch to his ribs at the same time. Had he shown that kind of energy, the singular focus she now displayed toward this house, he’d already own the cottage by now.
Even though she’d been in town only a few days, he’d heard from several people—Chief Bradens, Melba, his fellow firefighter JJ, even JJ’s brother, Max—about how Charlotte had gushed over her affection for the cottage. For crying out loud, it seemed even Karl at the coffee shop had gotten a speech about what she planned to do with the place. She’d spout off her plans to anyone who would listen.
Had he shown her initiative, acting more aggressively, more single-mindedly on his plans—the way Randy always acted when it came to business deals—Helen Bearson might have tipped him off that someone else had shown interest in the property. He could have found a way to inch past those final two months and purchase the property now. But no, his claim never went further than a comment to his folks or a vague remark to the other guys on the truck when they went past the vacant house. He’d never done anything more than occasional blue-sky thinking aloud. The plans had been there: real and detailed, meticulously compiled. But he’d kept them to himself, not wanting to be made the butt of more jokes or criticism if things didn’t work out. Now the spreadsheet calculating his accrued savings toward the goal felt like a misfire. No, worse: a dud.
Of course, Jesse knew better. His nobler side told him he had no right to his resentment. He had no practical claim to the cottage. This was just another example of his biggest flaw: always hatching plans and spending too long perfecting them to get around to acting on them. Dad would probably be gratified that his trademark inaction had once again come back to bite him. He’d lost the cottage, fair and square. You snooze, you lose. You’ve always known that. Maybe now you know it for real.
The only consolation—and it was slim consolation at that—was how Jesse’s gut still told him she belonged in that house. She had on these old-fashioned-looking shoes that would have looked ridiculous on anyone else, but with her flowing pastel dress and the fluttery scarf she wore, she looked as though she belonged right there on the cottage steps. “Vintage chic,” his mom would probably call it. All soft and frilly around the edges but definitely not stodgy, and with an artsy edge that let him know she’d have great taste. She wouldn’t gut the place and modernize it, stripping away all the history and charm—she’d do it right.
She flipped over the final page of the document he’d given her. “Wow, it’s a lot, isn’t it?” Despite her bright optimism, he could still read hints of sadness and confusion in her eyes. Trouble was, that determination just made him like her more. This job was starting to feel as though it could become a tangled mess all too easily—and even a mess-up like him knew it was never smart to mix business with pleasure. Even when the pleasure could land him a fat paycheck.
“It’s a big job, yes. The results will be fantastic, though. You’d double your money if you ever sold.”
“I won’t sell.” No buyer’s remorse from this buyer, that was certain. He got the feeling that once Charlotte Taylor set her course, she was unstoppable.
“Okay, so you want to stay. Well, we know there are some basic repairs you’ll need no matter what—like the stove and the upstairs bathroom—even if you do change your mind and decide to sell....”
“Which I won’t.”
“Which you won’t,” he echoed. “We can start with those and schedule out the cosmetic fixes and upgrades later. That way you start basic, but keep your options wide open.”
She leaned back against the porch stair railing. At least this railing held, not like the wobbly one at her front door. Jesse grimaced as he remembered the photo of the gorgeous wrought-iron railing sitting in his file back home. “Maybe, but first on the list has to be my new claw-footed bathtub.”
She’d gushed over the style of the old tub in the upstairs bathroom, saying she’d picked out some newfangled Jacuzzi version that still looked antique. “New is great, but you could also repair the one you already have. Old fixtures like that are hard to find and worth keeping—especially if you want to go the sensible route.”
Her eyes flashed at the mention of sensible, and she straightened her back with an air of defiance. “Or maybe I don’t compromise. Maybe I use all this free time to do the renovation exactly the way I want while I can.”
“Free time?” Jesse couldn’t help asking.
“I’m between jobs at the moment.” There was a flash of hurt in her eyes as she said the words, but it faded quickly. “It’s just a temporary situation. It’s not like I won’t find a new job. I’m very good at what I do. Lots of companies are ramping up their online commerce. Textile arts are big business these days, you know.”
She didn’t strike Jesse as the sensible type. More the artistic, impulsive type. Those customers were always the most fun—provided they had pockets as deep as their imaginations—which maybe still applied to Charlotte Taylor. He didn’t really know many details about what her financial situation was, nor was it his place to ask. Still, he’d seen this before, watching a customer compensate for some loss in their life by going overboard on a build. A guy’s divorce-driven five-car garage had bought Jesse his new truck. After all, a smart businessman gives the customer what they want, not necessarily what they need. “You could do that.”
“I could do that.” Her face took on the most amazing energy when she got an idea. She was going to be a fun client to work with, and certainly easy on the eyes.
Jesse suddenly found himself wondering if he could walk the line on this. Could he encourage her, suggest the smartest choices for what she wanted? Could he balance the indulgence of her whims while warning her against something that would prove to be a foolish purchase? Viewed practically, her windfall of free time might allow him to get more work done in less time.
He nodded to the proposal. “I’m not saying you have to compromise. A job this big would be hard to do while you were working full-time. If you set your mind to it, we could be done by September. If you’ve got the cash now, the timing might be perfect.”
She pointed at him, jangling the slew of silver bangles on her wrist. “Exactly how I see it. God’s never late and He’s never early.”
“Huh?”
“Something Mima always said. About God’s timing always being perfect, just like you mentioned. And I’ve always taken Mima’s advice.”
“You don’t have to decide right this minute. You want some time to think about it?” He had to give her at least that much of an out.
She squinted up at the sky, making Jesse wonder if she was consulting her grandmother or God or both. After a long minute, she held out her hand for the pen he was holding. “Nope. I don’t need any more time. This is what I want. I want it to be perfect.” She signed the proposal in a swirly, artistic hand.
This was going to be fun. In the end, they’d both end up with a showpiece—his to boast about to clients, hers to call home. Win-win, right? “Then the pursuit of perfect begins tomorrow afternoon.”
* * *
Charlotte 1, Cottage 0.
Charlotte congratulated herself on the tiny victory her cup of tea represented.
A few days ago, the scorecard might have looked a lot more like Kitchen 1, Charlotte 0, but a visit from the electrician Jesse had recommended and two hours of vigilant scouring this morning had put the kitchen in working order. Stopping in at the local housewares store, Charlotte had purchased an electric kettle to hold her over until a wonderfully vintage-looking but thoroughly modern stove came in on special order. At another downtown boutique, she’d found a charming bistro table with two chairs. It felt so satisfying to buy things for the house, to launch the project that was coming to mean so much to her. It made her long-overdue Owner of Cottage tea on her back deck just about perfect. Add one of Mima’s teacups and her favorite teapot, and life was wonderful.
See? I’m still here, she thought, smirking at the bright green leaves of the overhead tree. I will not be beaten by this bump in the road. “You know what Eleanor Roosevelt says,” Charlotte addressed a gray squirrel that was perched on the deck railing with a quivering tail and greedy black eyes, peering at the bag of cookies she’d just opened. “Women are like tea bags—you never know how strong they are until you get them in hot water.”
“Quoting first ladies to the wildlife, are we?” Jesse came around the corner of the house lugging a clanking canvas bag and an armful of cut lumber. “Look at you, having a proper tea on your back deck and all.”
Charlotte laughed. “This is not a proper tea. It’s barely even an improper tea.”
Jesse settled his equipment on the bottom step, leaning against the railing to look up at her. “A Mulligan, then.”
“A what?”
He grinned, looking so handsome that Charlotte was suddenly aware she was probably covered in kitchen grime. “You don’t golf, do you?”
“Not even mini.”
“A Mulligan is a do-over. The chance to retake a shot that went wrong.”
Well, that certainly fit. “Yes, I suppose this is a Mulligan tea. I’d rather think of it as a victory lap. I’m declaring myself the winner in the epic battle of Charlotte versus the Filthy Kitchen.” At least that was one thing she felt as though she’d won in this whole mess her life had become. “With a little backup from Mike the electrician, that is.”
Jesse started rummaging through the canvas bag he had set down. “Mike made sure all your other appliances are going to work safely?”
