Summer Rental (7 page)

Julia looked at Ellis’s outstretched legs. “Eww! Disgusting! Have you contacted our landlord?”

“Mr. Culpepper? Repeatedly,” Ellis said. “I sent him another e-mail just before I came downstairs. If I don’t hear from him by lunchtime, I’m go
ing to just find an exterminator in the phone book and tell Culpepper I’m going to deduct it from the rest of our rent. And I told him how unhappy we are about the mildew and the ants.”

“And the crappy mattresses, I hope,” Julia added. “I haven’t slept on a bed that lumpy since I went hosteling in Belgium after high school. We’re paying enough rent for this dump that we should at least be able to expect a decent bed.”

“About the rent,” Dorie said hesitantly. “I really think Willa should offer to go ahead and pay her share, even though she did cancel.”

“Did she offer to reimuburse us?” Julia asked.

“Not yet,” Dorie admitted.

“Well, I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for her to offer,” Julia said. “Even though good old Arthur is swimming in dough. It wouldn’t occur to darling Willa that the rest of us might be out-of-pocket because of her.”

“I could ask her,” Dorie volunteered. “But you know Willa.”

“We do,” Ellis said briskly. “So we won’t count on her chipping in. If she does, that would be great; if not, no biggie. Like I said, I’m seriously thinking of renegotiating our lease on Ebbtide. The place is totally not what he advertised.”

“I think it’s kinda sweet,” Dorie said. “Did you know, in the daylight, you can look through the cracks in the floorboards in that bathroom under the stairs and see little fiddler crabs crawling around in the sand under the house?”

“Sweet Jesus!” Julia said. “I am never using that bathroom again.”

“Oh, Julia, quit being so damned British,” Dorie said impishly. “You grew up in Savannah, Georgia, just like the rest of us. It’s not like you never saw a fiddler crab before. Or a cockroach or an ant.”

Julia stuck her tongue out at Dorie. “Screw you. I might have grown up living around creepy-crawlies, but that doesn’t mean I want to live with ’em as a grown-up.”

*   *   *

Ty had been watching the waves off and on since sunrise. They weren’t really that big, but it was a break—he’d been sitting at his computer for the pas
t twenty-four hours, researching cholesterol and statin fighters in every online medical journal he could find. He was no scientist—hell, he’d barely passed high school chemistry—but this new drug Hodarthe had come up with sounded like it could be a winner.

He’d done well the previous day with a start-up company in California that was doing interesting things using recycled glass in commercial concrete applications, so he had some funds, and he was poised to take a position with Hodarthe. But damned if he hadn’t just received
another
e-mail from Ellis Sullivan.

He chuckled to himself as he reread her latest missive. “WTF? Fleas!” Little old Ellis was turning out to be a real ballbuster. He found himself scratching at a phantom flea bite even as he read. She was right, though. He
did
have to do something about the fleas. If they got too out of hand, he’d never get rid of ’em, and they might just chase away Ellis and her girlfriends. He couldn’t afford to lose a month’s rent.

Much as he hated to, he picked up the phone and called an old high school buddy, Frank, who had gone into his father’s pest control business over in Elizabeth City. After some idle chatter about prospects for Carolina football (sorry) and the economy (way sorrier), Frank promised to head over to Ebbtide for a little bug-bombing session that afternoon. They even worked out a trade: Frank would provide pest control services for three months in return for a week’s vacation at Ebbtide.

Ty didn’t have to tell Frank money was tight; Frank knew about the jam he’d gotten himself into. Hell, everybody on the Outer Banks knew that Ty Bazemore was in a world of hurt. The first foreclosure notice for Ebbtide had been published in the newspaper in July, and every week since, the notice had run in the paper’s legal ads, rubbing salt into his already wounded ego. Six weeks. That’s how much time he had to pull off a miracle. Until then, he needed to keep his tenants happy and, somehow, raise enough money to catch up on six months’ worth of missed house payments and back taxes.

But it wouldn’t do to let Ellis Sullivan get the upper hand. So he fired off a missive of his own.

To: [email protected]

From: [email protected]

Subject: Alleged fleas.

Ms. Sullivan, if the house has fleas, you must have brought them with you. Likewise the ants. I’ve never had complaints before, about bugs or the mattresses. But Frank from Bug-Off Pest Control will be out today, after 2 pm. You’ll have to vacate the premises for at least two hours, unless you enjoy inhaling toxic fumes. If you don’t like my dishes, there’s a Walmart in Kitty Hawk. I’ll send somebody to take a look at the faucet. Happy?

Through the open door, he could hear the waves rolling into shore. He could stand it no more. He got up and strolled out to the porch.

The women of Ebbtide had pitched camp on a stretch of sand directly below. They had a jaunty striped pink-and-yellow umbrella, three lounge chairs, and a large cooler. The brunette, Ellis, and a tall, elegant blonde were playing Pro Kadima, inexpertly slapping the little rubber ball around, dashing back and forth in the sand, laughing hysterically.

The blonde was a knockout, with long, slender bronzed legs and a bright orange bikini that left little to the imagination.

The third woman was a petite strawberry blonde. She was stretched out in her chair, a pair of sunglasses perched on her little snub nose, reading a magazine. Even the loose-fitting sleeveless cover-up she wore over her swimsuit couldn’t disguise a body that was luscious—and that was a word Ty didn’t just throw around. Her pale, freckled skin was already turning pink, and it wasn’t yet noon.

But it was Ellis, pain-in-the-ass Ellis, he couldn’t keep his eyes off of. She’d knotted her long hair in a goofy ponytail on top of her head, emphasizing the graceful curve of her long neck. Her modest, black one-piece bathing suit should not have been alluring, but somehow it was—the high cut legs showed off her great butt, the scoop neckline revealed a promising amount of creamy cleavage. And when she ran, as she was doing now, looking like a total klutz, the suit rode up in the back and down in the front, giving him a rewarding view.

Ellis Sullivan was not by any means the hottest thing he’d ever seen on this stretch of beach. That honor, he thought, ironically, would have to go to Kendra, whom he’d first spotted the summer they were fifteen, as she did a slow, taunting stroll past him while he painted his grandmother’s Adirondack chairs on this same deck. He found himself scowling at the memory of that day.

*   *   *

Dorie had promised herself she’d go for a swim at exactly 11
A
.
M
. She ran and dove into the waves, letting them take her out and under, again and again. The water was wonderful. She floated on her back and looked up at the clouds, trying to force herself to empty her cluttered mind and think of … absolutely nothing.

But the worries lapped at her as surely as the warm waves. Damn Willa for backing out on them! Dorie had budgeted this vacation down to the last nickel, counting on splitting expenses four ways. And now? Her budget was blown to hell. She had just barely enough money to pay for her share of the rent, let alone kick in her share for groceries. And then there was Stephen. It was all just too sad, too awful. He would have loved this place. The thought came to her unbidden, as did the unexpected wave, washing over her face. She stood up, sputtering and choking, the saltwater burning her
eyes and throat.

She was running back to her chair when she spotted him—a man, standing on the second-floor deck of the garage right beside their house.

The other girls were opening beers when she got back. She opted for an icy bottle of water instead, and as she was toweling off, she glanced up and saw the man again. He hadn’t moved.

“Hey,” she said, running a comb through her tangled hair. “Who’s that guy?”

“What guy?” Julia said, not bothering to look around. She twisted the cap from her beer and took a long drink. “Probably one of your old boyfriends.”

“Wrong,” Dorie said. “I’ve never dated anybody from North Carolina. I had a boyfriend who went to Wake Forest, but that doesn’t count because he was from Charleston.”

“Where is this guy?” Ellis asked, standing up.

“Right there.” Dorie pointed towards the garage apartment. “He’s totally been staring at us for the past ten minutes.”

Ellis put on her sunglasses and looked.

“It’s him!” she exclaimed.

Now Julia was looking too. “Him who?”

“That’s the guy,” Ellis exclaimed. “Remember? I told you, he was standing right there, peeing off that porch, yesterday morning when I got here.”

“Gross,” Dorie said.

“He doesn’t look gross to me,” Julia said. “He looks kind of, um, yummy to me. He’s all tan and ripped. My God, look at those pecs!”

“Julia!” Ellis and Dorie exclaimed in unison.

“Excuse me,” Julia said. “Can I help it if I’ve had my fill of looking at flabby white Englishmen in the past few years? Have you two ever seen European men at the beach? They all wear those nasty little Speedos with their schlongs waving around.”

“Banana hammocks,” Dorie said, giggling. “Disgusting. Booker doesn’t wear one, does he?”

“Booker?” Julia said with a derisive snort. “Hah! Booker hates the beach. He always says if he wants to get sun poisoning or skin cancer, he’ll do it someplace with air-conditioning and decent cable reception.”

“Stephen loves the beach,” Dorie said wistfully. “He’ll drive out to Tybee in the middle of the winter, just so he can walk barefoot in the sand.”

“It’s just too bad he couldn’t come after all,” Julia said sympathetically. “Have you talked to him since we got here?”

Dorie’s eyes filled with tears. “No.…”

Ellis shot Julia a warning look. Julia shrugged.

“Oh look,” Julia said, turning back towards the dunes. “The guy! He sees us looking at him.” She gave him a coquettish wave. “And he doesn’t even care. Oh my God. He’s waving back. Who the hell is he?”

“That’s what I intend to find out,” Ellis said.

8

Ellis marched herself right up the stairway over the dune, stopping only to slide her feet into a pair of flip-flops she’d left at the edge of the steps.

“Hey!” she called, standing at the covered deck at the top of the dunes, her hands at her hips. “Hey, you!”

“Who, me?” Ty called, leaning down over the porch railing. He could just barely see a bit of her nipples from this vantage point.

“Yes, you,” Ellis retorted. “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“Just taking in the scenery,” Ty said innocently. “How about yourself?”

“My friends and I
were
relaxing on the beach,” Ellis said. “Until we became aware that we were being spied on by some pervert.”

“What makes you think I’m a pervert?”

“Yesterday I caught you pissing off that same deck. Today you’re up there staring at us. What’s your name, anyway?”

He was taken off guard by her question, and before he knew it, he was actually telling her. “My name is Ty Bazemore. Why do you ask?”

She nodded, seeming to memorize it. “Ty Bazemore. Is that it? Not Tyson, or Tyler?”

“Just Ty,” he said. “What’s your name?”

“None of your business,” she said. “What are you doing up there on that porch?”

“I happen to live here,” he said indignantly.

“Does Mr. Culpepper know you’re staying up there?”

He managed to suppress a smile. “Culpepper knows all about me.”

“Don’t you have anything better to do with your time?” she asked.

“Come to think of it,” he said, looking down at his watch, “I do.” He started to go back inside, but then he thought of something.

She was halfway down the beach stairs.

“Hey,” he called. “Why do you want to know my name?”

“So I can Google you,” she called back, not bothering to turn around. “And I intend to run the tag on that Bronco too, Ty Bazemore.”

“The perv’s name is Ty,” Ellis reported when she got back to the girls. “He claims he rents the garage apartment from Mr. Culpepper.”

“What makes you think he’s a perv?” Julia asked, thumbing through
Vogue.

“He was peeing off that deck!” Ellis said. “Right there in front of God and everybody.”

“That doesn’t make him a pervert,” Julia said, dog-earing one of the pages. “It just makes him a guy. My brothers used to pee off the second-floor porch at the house at Isle of Hope when they were kids. It was like a contest. Peeing for distance, they called it.”

“My brother did the same kind of stuff. And sometimes, when Stephen’s in the backyard mowing the grass, he’ll pee behind the garage,” Dorie volunteered. “He doesn’t think I know. I think it’s kinda funny. Didn’t your brother ever do anything like that?”

“Baylor wouldn’t have dared. My mother would have had a cat-fit,” Ellis said. “I don’t care what you guys say, I’m keeping an eye on Ty Bazemore.”

“Mmmm,” Julia purred suggestively. “I’ll help.”

“Me too,” Dorie said. “He’s adorable. He’d make the perfect summer fling for you, Ellis.”

“As if,” Ellis said.

*   *   *

At lunchtime, the girls trooped back up the dunes to the house.

“I’m starved,” Julia announced. She was leafing through a thick booklet advertising local shops and restaurants. “Where shall we go for lunch? Seafood, right? The fish we get in England is crap. It’s the one big thing I miss about living in Savannah. Do you guys remember my mom’s fried grouper sandwiches?”

“I remember her she-crab bisque,” Ellis said. Unlike her own mother, who was strictly a meat and potatoes, canned peas, and cherry Jell-O kind of cook, Catherine Capelli had been a fabulous cook. “And I’d give anything for another plate of her spaghetti with the Italian sausage that she’d make in the wintertime.”

“And those little yeast rolls she’d make, dripping with garlic butter,” Dorie put in. “And all the different kinds of cookies she’d bake every year at Christmas. She’d fix a huge plate for each of us to take home to our families. It’s a miracle we all didn’t end up fat little piggies after eating your mama’s cooking all those years, Julia.”