Happiness Key (4 page)

She realized she was standing at the door thinking
about pie when she ought to be thinking about Herb or Alice.

Nope, cancel the Alice part. Wanda caught a glimpse of Alice’s silver hair just in front of her cottage, then the granddaughter who had taken up residence at her side. As she watched, they both went inside.

“Herb, then.”

She was sorry if Herb was heading to the hospital or worse about now. And sorry, too, that on the day she’d made that Key lime pie, she’d eaten almost half of it in one sitting. Then, in a fit of anger, because even though it was
his
day off, Ken hadn’t come home to share it, she had wrapped up the rest, plunked it in her best ceramic pie pan—the one with the top that looked like crisscrossed strips of dough with an apple slice for a handle—and marched down to Herb’s house. He was puttering with those plants of his, and she’d handed the whole thing right over to him, just because she didn’t want Ken to have even a single bite if he ever came home again.

Now her very best pie pan, given to her by her daughter—who was not usually the best shopper—was at Herb’s cottage. She sure hoped he hadn’t been struck dead from an overdose of Key lime pie.

She had to do something about this mess. That pie pan was hers, and she had to get it back. Wanda went inside to finish her breakfast and figure out just how to do it, and when.

Before she locked the house behind her, Tracy retried the key that Maribel Sessions, the Realtor, had given her for Herb’s cottage. She hadn’t simply imagined the key didn’t fit. It didn’t. She hadn’t found a similar one lying around the house, either, not on his dresser or bedside stand.

Although the one Herb had been holding when he died didn’t look anything like the one she’d been given, she tried it now. As she’d guessed, it had been made for a different kind of lock. Thin and spidery, it looked like something out of a Nancy Drew novel:
The Secret of the Dead Man’s Key
. If Tracy had a mysterious garret or a tower to unlock, she might be in business.

Once she got home, she called Maribel, who handled leasing the cottages, and Maribel promised to give her the originals if Tracy hurried over before she left for the day. With the promise of a key that actually fit, Tracy went back and locked Herb’s doors, and took off for town. If worse came to worse, she could slit a screen and climb through a window to get back in.

To Tracy, Palmetto Grove always seemed a few shades paler than it ought to. Everything deteriorated quickly on the Gulf Coast. Sun, wind-driven sand, salt in the air, all stole the pigment from the brightest paint and rusted even the most expensive cars. Patches of sand marred emerald-green St. Augustine grass, despite sprinklers continuously spewing a sulphur-tinged spray. This time of year, only the hardiest flowers still nodded their colorful heads.

She pulled up to the curb in front of Sessions Realtors: Homes of Distinction, and locked her car. In a chilly reception area, made chillier by white marble tile and Grecian pillars, she told the receptionist that Maribel was expecting her. The woman obviously knew her name and jumped up to get Maribel from somewhere in back.

Tracy hadn’t even settled down with a magazine before Maribel came marching out, a huge smile pasted on a face that was keeping some lucky plastic surgeon in custom golf clubs and resort vacations. She had Gwen Stefani hair, which she emphasized with a matching creamy-
white business suit. Like the town she bought and sold, Maribel also looked three shades too pale.

“Mrs. Craimer,” she said, extending her hand. “So good to see you again. Have you decided to look for a house after all?”

“Maribel…” Tracy shook hands, then pulled hers away from Maribel’s slightly damp one. “Tracy
Deloche
now. Remember all that paperwork?”

Maribel looked charmingly chagrined. “I am so sorry. What am I thinking? It’s just that your husband was such a presence.”

“Ex-husband.” Right about now, CJ was probably a presence in the prison laundry, ironing shirts.

“I hope you’ve decided to have a good look at everything we have for sale.” Maribel lowered her voice, as if the empty room might be bugged. “The market is just the teeniest bit slow. You can pick up a bargain if you hurry.”

Tracy knew all about slow markets. In addition to the problems she was having with tree-hugger crazies who wanted Happiness Key to sit quietly and grow sandspurs for eternity, most developers were, at best, holding steady. Nobody with the resources to fight intrusive environmentalists wanted to take on Tracy’s problems. The economy. The hurricanes. The insurance. Tracy might look as if she were sitting on a gold mine, but like a lot of prospectors before her, if things didn’t improve quickly, she was going to be eating beans and sourdough biscuits for breakfast, lunch and dinner.

“I’m not planning to stay in Florida after I sell,” Tracy told Maribel, hoping that
this
time the message would sink in. “So I’m just going to stay in the extra cottage for now. But I do need the original keys.”

“Yes, I was sorry to hear about the renter. Mr. Cross?”

“Krause. While I’m here, I think I’d better get his file,
too. I need information on his next of kin.” She paused. “Might there have been a deposit? You know, to give back, after I’ve assessed damages?”

“Not that I recall. The terms of those leases were so loose. As enticement, really, to get somebody to live out there when they might have to vacate so quickly.”

Tracy was disappointed. “Well, that’s not very likely now.”

“Then you might be around for some time?”

Tracy didn’t want to tell Maribel she had no place else to go. That sounded so lame, so fricking pathetic. Almost as pathetic as using poor Herb’s mythical deposit to pay her bills. She put a better spin on it.

“I’m a very motivated seller. I want to stay on top of things. I know the market can change in a heartbeat, so I want to be right here for the kill.”

“Now that’s the can-do spirit.” Maribel toddled on impossibly high heels to a wall of wooden filing cabinets behind the reception desk, unlocked one and began to paw through it. “I tell my staff they need to stay on top of things that way, but lately I’ve lost some of my best. Of course, I’m planning to sell your land myself, so you have nothing to worry about. You’re my top priority.”

“I like being somebody’s top priority.” Tracy tried to remember if she ever had been.

Maribel pulled out a file folder and brought it over. Then she opened the top drawer of the desk, took out a ring of keys and handed her everything.

“I did make copies for all the cottages, so we’d have spares if a buyer wanted to see the inside. Of course, that’s unlikely, since whoever buys the property will simply bulldoze them.”

Tracy stored everything in the Fendi Doctor B Bag CJ’s secretary had picked out for her last birthday,
probably the last designer purse she would own for a very long time. She wouldn’t be one bit sorry to see the cottage she was living in bulldozed. And now that she’d spent part of an afternoon in the bedroom with the very dead Herb Krause, she wouldn’t be sorry to see his cottage disappear, either.

“You must be feeling at loose ends,” Maribel said. “How are you keeping busy?”

Tracy had been forced to spend a lot of time cleaning her cottage so she could tolerate sleeping in it, but that was boring and made her sound like a drudge instead of the glamorous ex-wife of one of California’s most colorful felons.

“I’ve spent some of it reading up on Florida and federal wetlands laws,” she said.

“Don’t you worry. Somebody will come along with the money to make Happiness Key a reality. I promise, we’re in this together.”

Tracy wasn’t sure she wanted to be in anything with Maribel Sessions. Right now Tracy’s property was a sizable blip on Maribel’s radar. The moment it became clear Happiness Key, as originally envisioned, was completely dead in the water, then Maribel would throw Tracy overboard and sail off without a backward glance.

The door opened behind her, and Tracy turned to find the most interesting man she’d seen in a long time walking into the office. He was probably just under six foot, lean, and, despite a thick head of silver-gray hair, young. He wasn’t sixty, not even fifty. She pegged him in his early forties, a man with enough confidence not to dye his hair. The confidence showed in the way he held himself, the set of his shoulders, the length of his stride. And, when he caught sight of her, his smile.

“Lee,” Maribel said. “Come meet Tracy Cr— Deloche.
She happens to own your mother-in-law’s cottage. Tracy, Lee is one of our agents.”

Tracy was trying to digest that when the man stepped forward and held out his hand. “Lee Symington, Miss Deloche. How are you?”

Lee Symington had one of those voices a woman could wallow and drown in. Deep, soothing, yet simultaneously intense. And giddyup! Blue eyes that almost leaped out of his tanned face.

“Tracy,” she told him. “Call me Tracy. And your mother-in-law?”

“Alice Brooks.”

It came together now. She was just glad Lee wasn’t related to
Wanda
. “Sure. Of course. I sort of met your daughter yesterday.”

“Olivia. I was just about to hop in the shower when you arrived. I’m sorry I didn’t come out and meet you then.”

The picture of Lee ready to hop into the shower was more than Tracy could handle, particularly with Maribel watching them.

“Did I understand correctly? Are we neighbors?” she asked.

“That’s right. I’ve moved in temporarily with Alice.” He glanced at Maribel to include her. “I haven’t had a chance to tell you, Maribel. Alice needs the help, and Olivia’s good for her. They’re very close. Alice hasn’t done well since my wife died. Karen was her mainstay, and I know she would want me to do anything I can.”

Tracy wasn’t sure what to say. That she was sorry Lee’s wife had died? That she thought he was a pretty awesome guy for helping the vague old woman who wasn’t really his responsibility? That she hoped he was out of mourning and ready for some company?

“I’m sorry she’s had a rough time,” Tracy said instead. “I’m sure it’s been hard for you, as well.”

“It’s been a year now. Olivia and I are coping. Alice will, too, now that we can take care of her.”

“I’m just here to pick up the key to Herb’s house. Mine isn’t working, and we haven’t found his. You do know he, uh, died?”

“Olivia called my cell. She saw the police. She was worried, and Alice was upset. They weren’t sure what was going on.”

Tracy added this tidbit to the guilt she was trying not to feel. Why hadn’t she thought to tell Alice what had happened, to break the news gently? And for that matter, why hadn’t she told Wanda or her husband about Herb? Somebody should pen a how-to book.
The Loveable Landlady
. Only she probably wouldn’t bother to read it.

Maribel consulted her watch. “Lee, will you make sure Tracy has everything she needs? I’ve got a showing in about ten minutes, and I’ve really got to scoot.”

She left in a flurry of goodbyes. Tracy was tempted to follow just to see if the afternoon sunshine turned Maribel a ghostlier white or lobster-red, but she was in no hurry to leave Lee Symington.

“So,
do
you have everything?” he asked. His eyes were warmly appreciative, and Tracy was glad she had taken the time to shower and change into a green sundress with a beaded halter top, as well as spray herself liberally with Island Capri before she came into town. She’d felt the need for some cheer, considering the events of the day.

“Everything,” she said. “But you can walk me to my car.”

He smiled, something in between the mature Richard Gere and the younger Harrison Ford. She was entranced.

He opened the front door for her, and her skirt brushed
his pants—nicely tailored summer-weight wool—as she passed. “I know you’re trying to sell Happiness Key. And I know it might take a while, considering…”

“Considering that everybody in every single government and private bureaucracy in Florida and beyond wants to tell me what I should and shouldn’t do with it?”

“That covers it nicely.”

“You probably know the story,” she said.

“Not all of it.”

“My ex-husband bought the land to develop it into a luxury condominium complex and marina. All very chichi. Then he had a few legal problems.” Which was like saying that Florida had a few alligators.

“And now it belongs to you?”

“It’s almost funny. I really didn’t know until the smoke cleared. But after he bought the property, CJ put the whole package into a legal liability corporation with me at the head. I signed all the papers, not paying that much attention. He told me it was a tax write-off, and I was busy planning a vacation somewhere and didn’t ask any questions. It’s a good thing I didn’t.”

“And now you can’t sell it.”

“Everybody’s standing in line to stop me. But the land’s worth a mint. After things pick up, some developer will buy it and pay all the bureaucrats under the table while he’s at it. He’ll promise to leave something else untouched, or reclaim something he’s already hacked to pieces, and they’ll look the other way. It’s just that I don’t have the resources to do that myself.”

“So what are you doing while you wait?”

Going silently crazy.

“I may look for a job,” she said, as if this were of no consequence, although with Herb Krause’s next rent payment a memory and the impending repairs to Wanda’s
cottage, the consequences of not having one could be serious. For the first time in her life, she might need to get her hands dirty.

“You must be bored. Have you thought about joining the Sun County Yacht Club?”

She tried not to laugh. She wondered exactly who she would give as a reference, and how she would pay for even a few months’ membership—not to mention the yacht.

She told a slightly different story. “I’d rather not make a lot of new friends to leave behind. But I thought a summer job might be an interesting way to find out more about the community. You know. Stay busy, learn a little more about how things work around here.”

“I wish you had a Florida real-estate license. Maribel could use another good agent.”