The Chesapeake Diaries Series (205 page)

“How’d she do?” Ellie met Carly with a hug near the front fender.

“She’s perfect.” Carly embraced Ellie in a bear hug, then stood at arm’s length to take a long look at her old friend. “You look fabulous. Working your fingers to the bone apparently agrees with you.”

Ellie laughed and held up her hands, which Carly grabbed and pretended to scrutinize.

“Girl, you weren’t kidding. When was your last manicure?”

“Too long ago to remember.” She gave Carly an extra squeeze before letting her go. “But strangely, I don’t miss my once-lovely nails.”

“Well, if I had to choose between this place and that old apartment of yours on Madison, I’d definitely choose to be here.” Carly stood back, her hands on her hips. “It’s a wonderful house, El. I can’t wait to see the inside. Come on.” She grabbed Ellie’s hand. “Show me everything.”

“Want to get your bags?” Ellie paused.

“Later. I’ll come back out and … oh, is that Dune?” Carly knelt down next to the little dog. “Oh, she’s so cute! Maybe you’ll get lucky and her owner won’t look for her.”

“I’m sure someone’s looking. How could they not? Maybe they just haven’t called the police station. I was thinking this morning that maybe they’re still looking around the neighborhood, or putting up posters or something. Or maybe they’re away.” It occurred
to Ellie then that she’d forgotten to call the vet. “Cameron suggested I call the vet in town. Apparently he’s involved in some rescue dog group and—”

“Cameron?” Carly stood and fell in step with Ellie. “Who’s Cameron?”

“Oh, he’s … well, at first I thought he was sort of like a handyman because he was doing little things around here, but he’s really a contractor. At least that’s what it says on the side of his pickup.” Ellie opened the door and held it for Carly, who stepped inside, then paused, looking around.

“There’s just something about a guy with a pickup that—oh, Ellie! This is so cool. Look at your dining room. Was all this furniture here?” Carly pointed to the sideboard. “Oh, that’s so pretty. My grandmother had furniture something like that. And check out your living room. I love that sofa!”

Carly dropped her bag on the floor and went directly to one of the club chairs and sat. “Real mohair circa 1940. This stuff is in prime condition, El. And totally back in style. Dealers in Manhattan would kill for this stuff.”

“I know. I’ve been checking online.”

Carly ran her hand along the wooden insert in the chair’s arm. “You’re so lucky, you know that? Once you start selling off things, you should make out quite nicely.”

“I think so. I’m planning on having a dealer come in to look things over for me.”

“Excellent idea.” Carly stood and walked to the fireplace and ran her hand along the wood. “Your
mantel is beautiful. And look at these ducks.” She lifted one and turned to Ellie. “Decoys?”

Ellie nodded. “Lilly Cavenaugh’s husband, Ted, was a well-known carver. Cameron thinks they’re worth a lot of money.”

“There’s that name again.” Carly grinned. “Who is this person?”

“He’s been sort of looking after the house. You know, keeping the grass cut and just making sure that nothing was amiss. He knew Lilly, and for some reason that I’m not sure I understand, he’s felt obligated to keep up with things around here.”

“Maybe he had a crush on Lilly.”

“Lilly would be, oh, I suppose maybe around one hundred if she were still alive.”

“And how old is Cameron?”

“About our age. Midthirties.”

“May-December romance.” Carly shrugged.

“I think she probably died when he was in his teens.”

“You mean she’s been gone for twenty years?”

“I’m not really sure when she died. Easy enough to find out, I suppose. Everyone around here seems to have loved her.” Ellie sat on the arm of the sofa. “And there are people here who remember my mother.”

“Well, you’ve said she used to come here when she was little, right?”

“Even later than that. Cameron remembers her. He knew her, Carly. He said he remembered when she came here when she was sick.” Ellie felt her throat constrict. “I’m not sure that I even knew that she came here when she was sick. If I knew, I don’t remember.”

“Well, how old were we when your mother was first diagnosed? We were still in high school, weren’t we?”

“We were sixteen.”

“Sixteen and living at boarding school. It’s very possible that you don’t know a lot of what went on back then.”

“And from what I’m hearing, she even lived here for a while.”

“Here? In this house?”

Ellie nodded. “I was always under the impression that she just visited here sometimes, but now I’m hearing differently.”

“You said that people remember her. You can probably ask around and find out.”

“And if I were Ellis Chapman, I’d have reason to do that. As Ellie Ryder, though …” Ellie shrugged.

“Good point.” Carly bit her lip. “There must be someone you can trust.”

“I trust my attorney, but he didn’t grow up here, either, so he wouldn’t know. His secretary, who has to be in her eighties if she’s a day, knew Lilly and knew my mom. I’ve thought about asking her. I think she knows who I really am.”

“Well, then, ask her what she remembers.”

“And there’s Grace Sinclair. She owns the little newspaper in town.” Ellie got up, opened her bag, and pulled out the issue of the
St. Dennis Gazette
that she’d picked up earlier. “I can always call her, I guess. Her number’s in here.”

“I’d ask.” Carly nodded vigorously. “I’d definitely ask. El, you can’t be living in this house where your mother once lived and
not know
.”

“I know. I keep thinking about it.”

“Too bad you can’t ask your father.”

“As if he would know.” Ellie made a face. The last thing she wanted was contact with her father. “He always acted as if this place didn’t exist. To hear him tell it, St. Dennis was just someplace that my mom passed through before she became famous and only stopped in now and then on her way to someplace else. I had no idea that she’d spent anything other than an occasional vacation here.”

Her voice dropped, remembering. “My father only wanted to go to places that he thought were important, places where the beautiful people went. St. Dennis wasn’t important, in his book, and the beautiful people never came here, so we never did, either.”

“You never came here with her?”

Ellie shook her head. “My dad always planned our vacations. My mom never had anything to say about it. Besides, she was always off someplace working. She almost never went with us. Usually she met up with us wherever we were going.”

“But she continued to come back here?”

“That’s the thing, I’m not really sure when. She talked about St. Dennis and about her aunt Lilly—her mother’s aunt, actually—and from what Cameron told me, she did come to visit when Lilly was still alive. But you’re right about me not knowing what my parents did while we were away at school. It never occurred to me to ask what they did while I was gone.”

“So she still had strong ties here, at least as long as her great-aunt was still alive.”

“I think she must have.”

“She was famous, people would have noticed.” Carly leaned forward, her elbows on her knees, her chin resting on her fists. “Maybe while you’re here, you can find the answers to all those questions I know you have.”

“I’m going to try.”

“Nothing like a good mystery,” Carly said. “I bet with a few well-directed questions to the right people, you can find out everything you need to know.”

“I haven’t had much time to think about it, to tell you the truth. I wasn’t kidding when I said I’ve been working my butt off here. I can’t even begin to tell you how tired I am at night. I hit that pillow, and I’m gone.”

“Totally worth it.” Carly looked around the room from the fireplace to the built-in bookcase that lined one entire wall. “I’ll bet your mom came here every chance she had. It’s a very comfortable house. I can see you snuggled up here with a glass of wine or a cup of something hot, a soft cozy throw, reading a good book, a fire blazing in the fireplace. Dune next to you on the sofa.” She smiled. “Don’t you have the feeling that others have done exactly that? Lilly, maybe even your mother. It seems like a happy house, for all it’s been vacant all these years. It feels like a house that’s been loved.”

“From everything I’ve been hearing, everyone loved Lilly and her husband. Even the neighborhood kids liked them.”

“As evidenced by the fact that people who knew them were watching over the house for many years after they were gone.”

Ellie nodded. “You know, it’s hard to explain, but
I’ve felt at home since the first night. Maybe the fact that my mother lived here and spent time here over the years and came back when she was sick has something to do with it, I don’t know. But I think my mother must have loved this house. Otherwise, she would have sold it after Lilly died and she wouldn’t have arranged for its care and maintenance all these years. She wouldn’t have wanted to save it for me.”

“I think you’re right. And I think that sooner or later, you’ll find the answers to all the questions you have about her time here.” Carly stood. “Now, think of someplace you’d like to go to have dinner while you take me for a stroll around your property. I want to get some pictures while it’s still light.…”

Chapter 10

“L
ola’
S
really is a lovely restaurant. The decor is charming and the food was delicious.” Ellie folded her napkin and placed it next to her now-empty coffee cup. “I’ve only been to one other restaurant in town since I arrived but I stopped going when I realized I was eating far too many take-out burgers.”

“You’re living on the Chesapeake Bay and you’re eating burgers every day?” Carly made a
tsk-tsk
sound. “With all the seafood they have on the menu here?”

“What can I say?” Ellie shrugged. “I was going for cheap.”

“Well, cheap was not on the menu tonight, since we’re celebrating your new home and dinner’s on my dad and mom,” Carly said. “They send their love and wanted you to know how much they miss you.”

“I love and miss them, too. I’ll never forget how kind they’ve been to me.”

Carly dismissed the comment with a wave of her hand. “You know they think of you as a second daughter. After all, we’ve been friends for a million years.”

“I’ll never stop being grateful for that, too, Car. You’ve been the best friend that anyone has ever had.”

“You’d do the same, and there’s not going to be any more discussion on that subject.” Carly finished the last of her wine.

“So let’s talk about you, then. How’s everything in your world? How’re things with Todd?”

Carly gave the thumbs-down sign. “Kaput.”

“What happened?”

“It’s hard to explain.” She paused. “Oh, the obvious is easy to explain. I’m pretty sure he has a girlfriend in Toronto. He’s spending more time there than anywhere else.”

“Seems pretty straightforward. So where’s the hard-to-explain part?”

“Oh, that’s the part where for some reason, I don’t think I really care. My first reaction was more akin to relief than shock.”

“Then maybe the universe did you a favor by removing him from your life. That way, you don’t have to go through any sort of hassle to break up with him.”

“Exactly what I thought.” Carly nodded. “You’d think that after having been together for two years, it would have been shocking, devastating even. But no. I only felt relieved. It made me realize that I hadn’t been paying much attention to the relationship lately, if the breakup was that painless. In retrospect, I can’t blame him for finding someone else. If I were in his place, I might do the same thing.”

Ellie shook her head. “You’d do the breakup thing first. You wouldn’t cheat.”

“True enough. Anyway, that’s done.” Carly signaled the waiter for their check and handed him a credit card. “What? You want to say something. I know you do.”

“I never liked him,” Ellie whispered sheepishly.

“I know.” Carly sighed. “Neither did my parents, but they never mentioned it, either, until we broke up.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t be. Water over the dam and all that.” Carly smiled. “Just promise me that next time you don’t like someone I’m dating—if there ever is a next time—you tell me straight out.”

“I promise.” Ellie crossed her heart with her index finger. “But you need to do the same.”

“I’ve always pretty much liked everyone you dated. Though there was that guy freshman year who was such a colossal jerk.”

“The sax player?”

Carly shook her head. “The football player.”

Ellie made a face. “After a while, I didn’t like him much, either.”

“Explains why it didn’t last very long.” Carly sighed. “You know, it’s been years since we were both single at the same time. It could be fun.”

“True enough. At least it could be if we were in the same place all the time.” Ellie nodded. “However, if I were to guess, I’d say I’ll be single for a lot longer than you will be.”

“How do you figure?”

“You’re going to be globe hopping and meeting all sorts of fabulous guys who will sweep you off your feet. I’ll be here in St. Dennis, scraping wallpaper and
dripping Corsica White on my head as I attempt to paint the ceilings.”

“You’ll probably have more fun. Besides, must be some single men around. Watermen. Oyster fishermen. Boatbuilders. Manly types.”

Ellie thought about that flannel stretched across Cameron’s shoulders. “Contractor.”

Carly raised an eyebrow. “You mentioned a contractor earlier.”

“Cameron. He’s pretty hot.”

“And single?”

“He asked me out, so I guess he is.”

“When?” Carly signed the slip the waiter brought. “Ready?” she asked Ellie.

“I’m ready.”

The two women stopped at the coatroom to pick up their wraps, then headed out into the evening air and to the parking lot.

Carly unlocked the doors, and once they were both inside the Porsche, turned to Ellie and said, “So finish. When did this guy ask you out?”

“This morning.” Ellie settled back into her seat and fought the urge to hold on as Carly peeled away from the curb.