"A summer project," Isabel confirmed, her eyes holding his. “Penny and I haven’t done something like this in years, but wereally want to again.” She drew in a breath. “So I hope you will let us do this.”
Penny, he noted, sat staring challengingly at him. She knew the exact reason they were really here in Sweet Blossom Bay. She knew what he was planning. Isabel was unaware that he’d started pushing to acquire Hearts Hotel to carry out their father's dream of a resort, which he had wanted to build for his children and their grandchildren in Sweet Blossom Bay.
“Yes, Darius,” Penny finally drawled, her head tilting slightly. “What do you say? A summer project to restore this beautiful house.”
He held her stare for a moment. A silent message passed between the two of them. But she didn’t back down. Her lips lifted into a smug smile as she knew he couldn’t refuse.
“I think that’s a great idea,” Darius said, turning to his sister whose eyes filled with joy, and his heart nearly exploded at seeing her genuine smile. As he gathered his emotions, he glanced down at the notepad. “What about the garden?" He looked up between the two of them. “Do I at least get to have a say in that seeing though the two of you have clearly got the house covered?”
"Of course, big brother. I know how much you enjoy gardening as it relaxes you so I deliberately left it for you," Isabel answered. "But we do have some ideas on it.” She gave him a cheeky grin that made his heart flip. He hadn’t seen that grin in a long, long time. She picked up the notepad and flipped the page there on top of it was the heading Garden — Darius. “We were thinking that we could clear the back. Redo the deck. Plant something living along the side path, because right now it is gravel andweeds. And maybe you can use your green thumb to plant a herb garden by the kitchen door."
“Or even one of your famous vegetable gardens as well?” Penny gave him another smug smile.
She was so loving this. Penny knew he was having doubts and this was her way of showing him which side of the struggle she was on. He gave a mental sigh and decided it might be nice to do some gardening for the summer. It was something Emma loved to do with him. Maybe she could bring her new besties over to come and help. His heart did another sort of flip when he thought about who would bring those besties over…
He abruptly stopped his train of thought and cleared his throat.
“That sounds like a great idea,” Darius agreed, then he gave Penny his own smug look. “You know what I thought we could do to replace that old cracked fountain in the middle of the drive?”
“What?” Isabel and Penny asked in unison.
“One of those Zen type gardens,” Darius told them and saw the surprise flash in their eyes. “This house gives that feeling of peace.”
“Yes, that’s what Penny and I were discussing at the hardware store,” Isabel admitted. “It’s like it’s been waiting for another family to settle in because you can feel the warmth of the generation that lived here and loved the place.”
A lump rose up and clogged Darius’s throat at his sister’s words that echoed what was secretly in his heart and currently tormenting his soul. The moment he’d stepped inside these doors he’d known that this project was going to be harder thanany he’d done before. Darius had acquired many smaller resorts, hotels, bed and breakfasts. Each one had torn a little at his soul as he tore them down to replace them with bigger resorts. He’d hardened his heart to the pain in the owners eyes as they handed over the deeds.He’d saved their livelihoods and left them well compensated. Now they could live their lives without the stress running those businesses caused them. That had always been his go-to excuse to appease the gnawing guilt and shut up that nagging voice at the back of his mind.
"That sounds amazing, Darius,” Penny agreed with him and then added, “What I want is a hammock at the back by those two large oaks that stand guard over the swimming pool.”
“We can do that,” Darius nodded.
“And deck swings,” Isabel added. “And loungers, and maybe we could make a dedicated barbeque area that can be closed off when it’s not in use.”
“Oh, I like that,” Penny agreed.
Darius knew he was slowly losing the battle with his subconscious on this project. For a moment he stood there and himself, picture what they were describing.
He could see what keeping the house for the family home in Sweet Blossom Bay would look like. Coffee on the back deck in the morning while the bay slowly awakened in the half-light. Isabel working along the shoreline in a long cardigan, the way she liked to. Penny at the kitchen counter with the paper doing the crosswords and then the sudoku as she always did. Emma asleep upstairs in the corner room she’d already claimed, her school clothes laid out for the painted-shutter school. The four of them sitting down to dinner on a Friday night with the doorsopen to the deck and the breeze coming off the water. He turned his head slightly toward the side Heart House and Hotel were. His pulse accelerated as he thought—and Linda as their closest neighbor.
The picture was so simple and so immediate that it took his breath away.
Then the picture of the carefully laid plans for the Sweet Blossom Bay resort flashed in front of him and his heart dropped as he knew the sweet image could not coexist with the plan currently on the Wayne Group books for this house and Hearts Hotel.
The development plan called for this house, the hotel grounds, the adjoining wetland reserve, and Heart House to be consolidated into a single parcel. The plan called for the bay-facing slope to be cleared. The plan called for a resort. Not a small one. A coastal resort and spa, the kind his father had been quietly building Wayne Group toward before he died. The kind that would draw a different sort of visitor entirely to Sweet Blossom Bay, that would change the town’s dynamic within five summers and make it unrecognizable within ten.
No, Darius,he reasoned with himself.The resort and spa would bring the kind of people that would ensure Sweet Blossom Bay would never just become a ghost town one day like so many other small towns had due to a lack of tourists and growth.
But the other voice from deep down inside him whispered:No, Darius, it doesn’t matter which way you like to spin it to make you sleep at night. The plan called for the destruction of the exact bay your sister is now planning to live the rest of her life beside raising her granddaughter.
Darius rubbed a hand across his jaw.
“Darius?” Isabel’s voice broke through his thoughts. “Are you okay?”
“Yes,” Darius said, nodding. “I’ve just got a lot on my mind with work and all the projects we have going on at the moment.”
“You’re onholiday,” Penny stressed the word holiday, deliberately taunting him with a saccharine sweet smile on her face. “You’re supposed to let go of all the office troubles.”
Darius let out a long breath he had not realized he had been holding as he glared at his best friend and righthand person. His look clearly said to Penny: You’re enjoying this way too much.
