Greta pushed the plate of warm clam puffs she’d brought out closer and watched as Francine took a bite. Her eyelids fluttered. “Oh, my dear girl.”
It gave Greta pleasure to see people take comfort in her food, and right now everyone seemed to need a good dose of it. “From where I stood, it was a big shock. Is it strange she’s never mentioned Ben before?”
“Yes,” Linus said.
“No. It’s been a long time,” Francine said. “They grew up and away. It happens.” She glanced toward the back hall that led to the library. “Perhaps I should go check on her.”
“After your drink.” Linus, who’d paused his cocktail shaking for the conversation, added the egg white into the shaker and started up again. Greta loved that he was old school with the drink. They watched with reverence as Linus carefully poured the frothy pink concoction into a chilled glass.
“You know, it’s too bad,” Francine mused. “After all their years together, I always thought those two would end up together.”
Greta considered Francine’s words. “I’ve never had a love like that,” she admitted.
“Nor I,” said Linus, a little sadly.
Francine nodded. “I did, and I miss him every day.”
Greta was glad Francine was here. As much as she appreciated Holly’s energy and the fresh direction she was taking them in at the inn, they were so close in age. Francine’s presence offered a learned calm that Greta felt herself missing, the mother bird to their little nest.
“Well, here’s to love,” Linus said. They watched as he drizzled a line of Luxardo cherry syrup across the egg white foam and ran a toothpick through, creating three tiny hearts. Then he slid the glass gently across the bar.
Francine took a sip. “Tastes like love.”
When Linus took a little bow, Greta found herself smiling. Other people might think it was a whole lot of fuss for one craft cocktail, but she got it. Maybe they weren’t such different animals.
“I wish I’d gotten here sooner to see Ben for myself,” Francine said. “I’m betting he’s still handsome?”
Linus nodded vigorously.
Oliver, who was much more Greta’s type (if she had one, which she really did not), was outdoorsy and a bit rumpled, but in a pleasing masculine way. Ben seemed the opposite: close shaven, preppy, put together. Perhaps more tightly wound? Not her type, but very easy on the eyes. She would never have believed he was the shellfish delivery guy. “Maybe too handsome,” she decided.
Francine laughed. “Well. Nothing like a handsome man in your kitchen.”
That was the thing, Greta realized sadly. All summer she had had a handsome man in her kitchen. And just as she’d decided she actually wanted him there, he was already slipping through her fingers.
Holly
Ben Walters was back. Holly brushed her teeth and stared at her reflection. It was the same mirror she’d brushed her teeth in since she was a little girl, but the face staring back at her was anything but. This summer she’d worked so much that her skin was not the least bit tan or her nose freckled. Not that it mattered; she slathered on SPF 50 every day anyway. But still. The stark contrast was further proof that she had grown up and yet so little had changed.
As a reader, Holly had always gravitated to thrillers and mysteries, but recently she found herself leaning into cozy stories of homecomings and small-town life. There was comfort in those full-circle moments, whether on the page or in a saccharine TV movie, the very ones she used to tease her roommates for watching back in college. Embarrassing as it was to admit, Holly was guilty of harboring her own main-character moment hopes when she’d made the decision to move back to the Cape. True, she was a wash-ashore and not a local; but Chatham andPleasant Bay were her summer home, and coming back to stake out her own little page in the story felt right.
The plan had seemed so straightforward, at first. Renovate the inn as best she could afford to. Implement a handful of new concepts gleaned from her years in the hospitality industry. Try to spark new interest in the old inn, so that Francine would never have to entertain the offer Mr. Sullio had made.
This was the reason Holly had started the farm-to-table dining offerings, expanded the Harvest, and opened all of it to the public. It was also why she’d worked to partner with other local businesses to curate personal excursions for her guests that went beyond the doors of the Cranberry House, like the Monomoy boat tour and the wellness treatments at Chatham Bars Spa, as well as the bike excursions on the Cape Cod Rail Trail. And then, on top of all that, she’d dip her toe in the wedding industry, which was booming on New England coasts during summer months. Who didn’t want to be married at a coastal destination at the height of the season? Providing a distinctive guest experience was her goal, but if she was honest her reason was a bit more selfish.
Holly’s reason was her love for the Cranberry. She didn’t care about seaweed wraps or bridal brunches. What mattered was saving the inn. The old house had such a storied history here on the bay, and in her family; sharing it with newcomers meant it would go on.
Now, here she was, waist-deep in all of it. Yet instead of feeling like the leader she wanted to be to her staff, she’d been reduced to school-girl status by a run-in with none other than Ben Walters. Who was not only back, but apparently a lawyer turned shellfish farmer. How was that for a plot twist?
Drained, Holly smoothed on moisturizer and slathered on eye cream. What she wanted was to know why Ben was back (and where was his wife?). But what she needed was a good night’s sleep.
As she climbed into the old single bed in the same rosebud-wallpapered room she’d stayed in each summer, she thought of the people who had bet on her. Franny, whose room across the hall lay empty so that she could try this on her own. Greta and Linus, who’d stayed on when Franny handed over the reins. And the rest of the staff, who made the place run smoothly each day, like Oliver and Josephine and Paul. It was so quiet upstairs at the rear of the inn; the only sound was the distant ding of a buoy, her toll to go to bed. Holly stretched and sank lower in the covers. At this late hour, the night sky and water merged as one milky pool of darkness. Across the cove a few squares of light glowed in house windows. She reached for her bedroom light and flicked it off, filling her room with shadow.
Across the bay another light flicked off in the distance. Holly sat up, staring. Sure enough, the light blinked on, then off, once more. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” she whispered.
Traitor that it was, her heart skipped against her ribs. Against her better judgment, Holly reached for her lamp and turned it on and off. The light across the cove echoed. Holly laughed out loud.Damn you, Ben Walters.
When she drifted to sleep she dreamed of floating in a Boston Whaler, the sun beating down overhead, the only sound being the gentle slap of water against the bow as they drifted across the bay.
