Queen Bee Goes Home Again (8 page)

Working at her brokerage for the past decade, I had learned that she wouldn't let up till she got her way. “Oh, all right,” I relented. “When do I meet him, and what's he looking for?”

“Day after tomorra,” she all but crowed, “at nine in the morning, here at the office. And he's looking for a three-two in really good shape, here in town, under one twenty-five.”

Thanks to the recession, there were plenty I could show him, but most were old, in varying degrees of disrepair.

“I've already pulled up what's available in the listings,” Julia went on. “And by the time you take him around, I'll have shaken loose a few more.”

Julia could tell you the financial, political, and medical condition of everybody within the old city limits. Plus every single person in the whole county who was in arrears on property taxes.

A lot of her deals were direct with sellers who needed to get rid of their houses, but didn't realize it till Julia brought them a buyer and laid out the numbers.

“Okay,” I relented. “I'll come down tomorrow to get those listings and check them out.”

“Oh, goodie.” I could swear she was rubbing her hands together.

I frowned. “Julia, what have you got up your sleeve?”

“You'll see, day after tomorra,” she gloated, then hung up.

I laid down my terrorist phone and sighed. Better get up and finish that FAFSA form, so I could go help Miss Mamie before I had to go back to work for this one, last customer.

And what a customer he turned out to be.

 

Eight

I tried my best to weasel the truth out of Julia the next day when I went to get the listings, but she refused to budge. Just smirked all over me and insisted I leave to preview the houses.

My completed FAFSA form and copies of my tax return and documents were in my car, to be dropped off at Ocee before I started checking out the listings. The transcripts were still pending.

No matter how it turned out, I felt better trying, at least, to start something new.

With that off my mind, I could concentrate on finding this customer a great house for the money. The first five listings I previewed were possibles, but the next four were too old and musty to snag even a male buyer. Of the remaining six, four had once been really nice, but abusive renters had seriously trashed them. Julia had said the customer wanted something move-in ready, so that eliminated a lot of the bargains in town.

Hot and frustrated, I went back to the real estate office and tried to find some more.

The problem living in town was, there were no guarantees about what you'd find next door. Tidy little bungalows with meticulous landscaping abutted rundown rentals or old-timer ramshackle places. Gracious homes of garden club members backed up to ancient shacks from the “black” section, as the old ladies called it.

Surely I could find one decent, attractive house for this guy.

Julia came in grinning like a mule eating briars. “You know that cute place next door to y'all that Jerry Ronson bought from the city for a dollar, then redid as an office space? Well, guess what? Since the bottom fell out of the commercial market, he's had it zoned back to residential and put in a kitchen, then converted the offices to two big bedrooms with two full baths.” She handed me the keys. “He's carryin' a ton of properties, so he'd love to unload it. Asking only ninety-nine, five, completely redone. Probably what he has in it. Only thing missing is a laundry room, but there's a big closet in the back hallway where a buyer could put one in. Why don't you check it out?”

I took the key. “But it only has two bedrooms. He asked for three.”

Julia dismissed that with a flutter of her scarlet manicure. “He can do with two.”

Even though our thick, ancient camellia hedges blocked the house from Miss Mamie's first-floor windows, I didn't want a drug dealer or a cranky neighbor next door. Or another jerk like Grant Owens. “Here's hoping your guy's the kind of person we'd like to have as a next-door neighbor.”

“Oh, he is, my dear,” Julia crowed. “He is.” She picked up her phone. “I'll call Jerry and have him spruce up the yard for tomorrow.”

Julia was enjoying herself so much, I didn't question her further before I left.

I parked in our garage, then walked around to the front of the new listing. Once there, I unlocked the new insulated steel front door and stepped into a blessedly cool, simple space with neutral gray walls, white trim, dark hardwood floors, and new, energy-efficient doors and windows. Jerry had done away with the interior walls of the old living room, kitchen, den, and dining room, opening the smaller rooms into one big area with a shiny kitchen along the back wall, defined by a counter-height pale gray granite peninsula that offered lots of casual seating.

That should be plenty of kitchen for a single man. I'd once sold a rundown bungalow to a rabid recycler old bachelor who'd promptly torn out the rotted kitchen, then happily settled for a secondhand refrigerator, sink, and a microwave on a TV table in its place.

This bungalow, built for supervisors from the mill, used to have three small bedrooms, but Jerry had wisely split the space between two larger ones, each with generous closets back-to-back and a roomy bathroom with separate tub and shower for each one.

Great storage spaces in every available nook. Smart move.

And everything had that new-paint smell.

Perfect.

The only drawback (besides the missing bedroom) was, Jerry also owned a half-restored version of the same house on the other side, which might become an attractive nuisance if he couldn't afford to complete it for sale. In these times, abandoned houses quickly became drug hangouts.

I made a mental note to call and ask him his plans. Maybe I could nudge him into locking up the other place, at least.

Back home that night, I ate my frozen low-carb meal, then watched reruns of
NCIS,
but when ten rolled around, I wasn't sleepy.

The outside temperature had dropped to the mid-seventies, so I put on my pink seersucker robe, bombed myself with insect repellent, then took a quart glass of decaffeinated iced tea to the rocking chairs on Miss Mamie's porch. I eased into the second white rocker from the front door, then leaned back to savor the night.

I breathed in the smells of fresh-cut grass, granite dust, sweet autumn clematis, and creosoted railroad ties, an appropriate mix for a railway town like ours. In the “management” houses across the tracks, only a few small bathroom windows glowed yellow, just as they always had since I was young. Apparently, people on what was now the good side of the tracks still went to bed at a decent hour.

High in the trees above me, July flies sang the summer songs of my childhood, accompanied by a chorus of frogs from the nearby branch (Southern for
small stream
) for which the town was named.

Serenaded by those ageless sounds, I closed my eyes, believing, just for a moment, that I was still in my prime, a woman who made men sit up and take notice. That I could still dance and sing and stay up really late to finish whatever I needed to do.

But I couldn't hold on to the illusion any more than I'd been able to hold on to my marriage, and the vision melted into the muggy darkness. An unexpected tear escaped the outer corner of my eye to run down in front of my ear, then another, and another.

Weary of losing the things I'd loved and having to fight my way back, I sank in the rocker.

Lord, I am too old to start over. Too tired. Too discouraged. I just don't think I can do this.

What about Sarah?
my inner Puritan pointed out.
She was over ninety, and she had the good grace to laugh when she was told she would have a son. At least you're not pregnant.

My stubborn self came back with
First
,
I haven't had a uterus since nineteen eighty-six, and you know it. And second, Sarah had a husband and servants to take care of her.

A soggy cloud of self-pity settled inside me.

I should have brought my cell phone. I needed to talk to Tricia.

I was considering going to get it when Tommy came outside with a Diet Coke and plopped down beside me. He looked over and frowned. “You okay?”

“No.” I had no intention of going into it. I'd sound as self-absorbed as I was. After all, I had plenty of food, a car, a safe place to live (for free), air-conditioning, and indoor plumbing. That put me head and shoulders above ninety-eight percent of the world's population.

Tommy didn't press. Instead, he took a long sip of his soda and rocked.

Just having him there made the lump in my chest shrink.

Then he said quietly, “I felt rotten when I had to move back in. So I drank even more to compensate. But eventually, I realized I had to change, or die.”

He rolled the cold, sweating can across his brow. “It took a long time to get my head on straight, but I've learned a lot.” He finished the drink, placed the can on the painted floor beside his chair, then turned my way. “I learned to live in gratitude instead of anger and fear.”

So had I, but I was fresh out of gratitude at the moment.

He went on, “There's joy to be had in every day, even if it's just rocking here with my big sister on the porch.” The compliment was indirect, but welcome.

His voice softened. “There's still plenty of life in you, Lin. If you want to get a degree, get one. Don't let anything stop you, not even yourself.”

I felt better hearing that and gave my brother's callused hand a brief squeeze where it rested on the arm of his rocker. “Thanks. But honestly, I'm not even sure I really want to, or if it was just the only other job I could think of that didn't make me want to put a gun to my head.”

“Sounds like a good enough reason to do it.” He smiled, looking out into the small-town darkness for a long time before he broke the silence with, “Sure I can't talk you into going fishing with me at five?”

I pulled myself up by the bootstraps and said, “Actually, I'm showing houses in the morning to some guy who wants to move into town.”

“Thought you were through with that.”

“I was, but you know Julia. She's bound and determined for me to show this guy around, so there you are. What Julia wants, Julia gets.”

Tommy chuckled, followed by a salacious, “Oh, yes. Including me.”

I tucked my chin and stared at him. “You don't mean to tell me that you and Julia … you know.”

Tommy nodded with a smug smile. “Oh, yes, siree. Not recently, mind you. But for one spectacular summer when she was between husbands, she took me to places I had never been, for which I will be eternally grateful.”

I covered my face with my hands. “TMI, TMI!” The thought of my brother and Julia doing the nasty … Please, mind, do not go there!

Tommy let out an exasperated sigh. “You are still such a prude.”

“Yes, I am,” I shot back, “and I'd like to keep it that way.”

He sent me a smug sidelong glance as he got up to leave. “Just wait'll God sends you a man who rings your chimes, and talk to me then.”

“I am done with all that, and good riddance,” I said. Despite my failed marriage, I had very high standards, which had doomed the three relationships I'd tried since my divorce. Was it wrong of me to want a kind, intelligent, decent Christian man who wasn't totally self-absorbed or obsessed with alcohol or sex?

Tricia had said I wasn't being realistic, but I'd rather have no man than a bad one, so there you are.

Then I met Connor Allen.

 

Nine

I got up early, took a cool shower, then caught my chin-length blond hair back with combs and scrunched it well in back till it curled and dried, which didn't take long in the air-conditioning. I fluffed it into soft curls with an Afro pick, then dressed as nicely as I could, considering the thermometer. Customers and clients treated me with more respect when I dressed professionally, so I left the house in lightweight Chico's black travel pants, a white cotton camisole over an industrial-strength bra, a pink silk overshirt, and black sandals.

Pulling into the brokerage's parking lot at five till nine, I saw a gray Taurus with North Carolina plates parked next to Julia's Cadillac SUV.

Rats. He'd beaten me there.

I summoned my inner duchess, then sailed into the office.

Standing there beside Julia was one of the best-looking, kindest-looking older men I'd ever seen in my life.

He was tall and slim, just as I liked. His neatly cut hair was purest white, but his intense blue eyes and expression were young with the twinkle of a mischievous little boy.

He stared right back at me with unveiled assessment.

Then he broke into a million-dollar smile and offered me his hand. “Julia,” he said, his eyes still on mine, “you didn't tell me my agent was going to be so beautiful.”

His grip was firm and didn't let go, and that voice … low and smooth and cultured, but still Southern.

I blushed like a girl from the top of my camisole to my hairline. “And you didn't tell me our buyer was so good-looking,” I said, then thought better of it. This was business, not a flirtation.

With my track record, he was probably the latest in a long line of jerks. But hubba hubba, was he a gorgeous one.

Chemistry. Serious chemistry.

What was I doing feeling chemistry at this stage of my life?

“Lin Scott, this is Connor Allen,” Julia introduced. “Connor, Lin will be showing you the best of our local listings.” Smug as a monk on a keg of wine, Julia revealed, “Connor has been called as the new pastor for Mimosa Branch First Baptist. He starts work in two weeks, so we need to get him into the perfect house right away.”

I almost choked. A
minister,
and a Baptist one, at that?

Baptist ministers didn't date divorced women. Usually, they wouldn't go anywhere with a single woman unchaperoned, much less a grass widow like me.