Читать книгу The Beekeeper's Ball - Susan Wiggs, Susan Wiggs - Страница 11

Chapter Four

“I’ll show you to your room,” Isabel said, approaching Cormac, who was taking his luggage from his Jeep.

He turned and shot her a grin. “I bet you’ve always wanted to say that, right? ‘I’ll show you to your room.’” He spoke with crisp formality.

“Right,” she said. “I mean, right this way.” She mimicked his formal tone.

“Thanks. And thanks for helping me this morning. I’m guessing a trip to the urgent care place wasn’t on your agenda today.”

“It never is. How are you feeling?”

“Fine. Nothing like a shot of artificial Adrenalin to get the day started. I took a hike around the place and made a few calls. Your grandfather around?”

“Always. He likes tinkering in the machine shop, or being out in the orchard with the workers. I’m sure he’s eager to meet you.” She led the way to the entry. It was looking grand these days, a lovely archway framing a view of the big sunny central patio. The wings of the hacienda curved generously around the brow of the hill upon which the house sat, the whitewashed walls expansive and cleanly cut against the blue sky. In the center of the broad, open space, a fountain burbled, the water flashing in the sunlight. Flowers bloomed in pots and espaliers along the walls. Two cats—Lilac and Chips—prowled around, Lilac shadowing the dark gray tabby as if to keep him away from the fountain. The workers were finishing up the pergola, creating a shaded area for café tables.

“This is fantastic,” said Cormac. He glanced down as Chips, the older cat, rubbed up against his ankle. “Hey, buddy.”

“That’s Chips. The white Siamese is Lilac, our latest rescue. We call him Lilac because it was springtime, and the lilacs were in bloom, and he has that unusual color. He takes a bit longer to warm up to people.”

Cormac leaned down to stroke Chips, who turned his head this way and that, his eyes shut in pure indulgence. Then, with slow dignity, he padded away. “Is that guy okay? He seems a bit unsteady.”

“Chips has a kind of feline Parkinson’s, so he has trouble getting around,” said Isabel.

“The white one seems to look after him,” said Cormac, watching Lilac swirl carefully around the older cat.

“He does,” said Isabel. “Chips rescued Lilac, and now Lilac takes care of Chips.”

“He rescued him?” Leaning on his cane, Cormac bent and stretched his hand out toward the white cat. Lilac perked up and sidled closer.

“Well, he brought him home one day and we started feeding him. At first I thought Lilac might be feral. He was so skittish, wouldn’t let anyone but Chips near him. The two were inseparable. Then I noticed that Lilac knew what to do with toys, and seemed to understand what a bowl of kibbles is, so I figured he wasn’t wild after all. He must have been dumped.”

To Isabel’s surprise, Lilac rubbed his head against the guy’s hand. Cormac scratched his finger between Lilac’s tipped ears. “We’ve all been there, buddy. Who dumped you?”

“It happens, unfortunately,” Isabel said. “An owner moves or passes away, and a cat gets turned out into the wild. Lilac just got lucky that Chips brought him home one day. And now Chips is the lucky one. Lilac once saved him from drowning.”

“Seriously?” He straightened up, steadying himself with the cane.

She nodded, shuddering a little at the memory. “We heard Lilac yowling on the patio one day, and came out to find that Chips had fallen into the fountain. He would have drowned, but Lilac got our attention.”

“They both got lucky,” Mac said. “Whaddya think, guys? Am I going to get lucky, too?”

Isabel assumed it was a rhetorical question, so she said nothing.

“Tess told me I was going to like it here,” he told her as the cats wandered away, making the rounds of the patio. “She says it’s like living in a dream.”

“Tess said that?” Isabel couldn’t conceal a smile.

“Yep.”

“Well, she wants you in Erik’s room. It hasn’t been updated yet, but Tess thinks you’ll like it.”

“Who’s Erik?”

“Our father. He passed away before either of us was born. I’m sure you’ll get the whole story out of Grandfather.” She led the way into the vestibule and up the winding staircase, which split into two at the landing like great wrought-iron wings, echoing the outer curves of the house. Bella Vista had originally been built for a large extended family and a staff, as well. Its three stories were filled with room after room, which Isabel was transforming one by one into guest quarters.

They went down a wide hallway to a room on the end. She could tell Ernestina had freshened it up. The linens looked crisp and smelled faintly of lavender, and the dormer windows were open to let in a breeze. A bowl of fresh fruit sat on an antique washstand, and the fixtures in the adjoining bathroom gleamed.

“After my father died, my grandparents never changed anything in here, just closed it off,” she said, turning to Cormac. He was so close behind her that she nearly ran into him—into that broad chest. He smelled even more manly than he had this morning.

As Isabel grew older, she had begun to understand why her grandparents had simply closed the door to Erik’s room. Even though Ernestina, the housekeeper, kept it aired out and dusted, the tragedy of his death seemed to hang in the atmosphere. There was a poignant sense of unfinished business, an unfinished life. Everything was frozen in time, as if he had just stepped out, never to return. She wondered if Cormac O’Neill noticed that, or if it was just her, imagining a connection with a man she’d never known.

Cormac set his large bag on a cedar chest at the end of the pine post bed. Erik’s boyhood room was still festooned with AC/DC posters, sports equipment, college pennants, old yearbooks, French and Spanish textbooks. Cormac went over to the built-in bookcase and ran his finger along the spines of the books there, some of them bleached by the light.

“Your dad liked books,” he commented.

“That’s what my grandparents said. When I was young, I made it my mission to read every single volume in this bookcase.”

“Why? To get inside his head?”

“As much as you can get into the head of a person you’ve never met. I made a valiant attempt. My favorites were Kon Tiki and Treasure Island.”

“Good choices. I loved those books.” He pulled out a copy of White Fang and opened to the inside cover. There was a bookplate on which Erik had written his name, the letters slanted in a careless or perhaps hurried scrawl. Cormac replaced the book and moved on to a row of travel books about Zanzibar, Mongolia, Tangier, Patagonia. “He was a fan of traveling. Or travel books.”

Isabel nodded. “He went to the University of Salerno in Italy, as part of the exchange program with UC Davis. That’s where he met my mom.”

“Are the French and Spanish books his, too?”

Isabel nodded. “According to Grandfather, Erik was a gifted student of languages. He grew up speaking Danish with his parents, Spanish with the workers and French because he loved it. And Italian, because he loved my mother.”

“Your mom’s Italian?”

“She, um, she died in childbirth. Giving birth to me.” Isabel’s own mother was yet another ghost in the house.

She caught Cormac’s flash of stark sympathy, which made her feel slightly apologetic, given what Tess had just told her—that Cormac O’Neill was a widower. “I know, this makes me Little Orphan Annie, but honestly, my grandparents were wonderful parents to me. If you lose someone before you know them, does it count as a loss?”

He hooked his thumbs into his back pockets and looked out the window. “Every death is a loss,” he said quietly.

“Of course. I’m just saying, it didn’t hit me the way it did Erik’s parents. Or Francesca’s. That was my mother’s name—Francesca.”

Cormac went over to a faded round dartboard and examined some papers stuck in place with a dart. “Looks as if Erik knew how to get in trouble, too. Aren’t these unpaid speeding tickets?”

“Yes. He drove a Mustang convertible.”

Cormac moved on to a display of ribbons. “What are all these for?” he asked.

“Okay, so he was a typical boy in every way—but he had this quirk,” she said. “He was a master baker. He won the Sonoma County Fair Blue Ribbon for the youth division from 1978 to 1982 in several categories.” She touched one of the fading ribbons. “Going through this stuff is like putting together a puzzle—but an imperfect one. I have all these artifacts—the things he left behind, photographs, stories from my grandparents and people who knew him. But I never got to know him, so that picture will never be accurate.” She opened a drawer of an old wooden desk. “My favorite artifact—his recipe collection.” Though she didn’t say so, this was when she felt closest to Erik—when she was following a recipe he’d put a little star by or annotated in his messy handwriting.

Cormac plucked a photograph from the drawer. “He’s a grown man in this picture.”

It was her favorite shot of Erik, one she used to take out and study when she was growing up. The photo showed him standing on Shell Beach, out on the Sonoma coast, with the cliffs sweeping up behind him and the ocean crashing around his bare feet. He was smiling broadly, maybe laughing, in the picture. He wore a red baseball cap turned backward, board shorts and no shirt. The camera had frozen him in a moment of freedom and joy.

“He’s younger in this picture than I am now.” She shook off a wave of regret, then shut the drawer with a decisive shove. “So, do you want a quick tour, or...?”

“Sure.” He turned and grabbed his cane.

“What happened to your leg?” she asked.

“I wish I could say I trashed my knee while doing something awesome, but it happened at JFK airport when I was running for a flight.” He shrugged. “It’ll be okay.”

In the middle of the second floor were the two biggest suites, one facing north, the other south. “We just finished remodeling them,” Isabel said. “Careful, I think the paint might still be wet on the doorframes.”

He scanned the new furnishings, the bright walls and window seats. “It’s great, Isabel.”

“Thank you. This has been a labor of love, for sure.”

“What’s up those stairs?”

“Third floor. My room, a few more guest rooms....”

Leaning on the hand rail, he went up the stairs. Isabel told herself to get used to this. Grandfather had invited the guy to explore their lives, and she supposed that meant he would be poking around every room of the house.

She showed him the guest rooms on the third floor, including the suite where Erik and Francesca had lived after they married. Though currently unfinished, this was going to become the honeymoon suite, romantic and private, appointed with luxurious fabrics and a special dressing room for the bride.

“And this,” she said, opening a door to a small sunroom, “was my grandmother’s domain. It hasn’t been refurbished yet, either. I’m not sure what to do with it.” Although Bubbie had been gone for ten years, her presence could still be felt in the closed-off room. Her sewing machine stood in the corner, still threaded, the needle raised as if awaiting orders. Under the long bank of windows was a faded daybed where Bubbie had lived the final days of her illness. She had spent time doing the things that mattered to her—simple things—visiting with family and friends, writing letters, gazing out at the beautiful view, enjoying a cup of tea with a buttery cookie, reassuring Isabel and Magnus of her love.

But Bubbie had never divulged the biggest secret of her life.

Regarding the sunroom, Isabel felt a surge of inspiration. “I’d love to turn this space into something Bubbie would appreciate,” she said.

“Need any suggestions?”

Not from you, she thought. “I’d love it to be a place of dreams, somewhere to sit and think.”

“Thinking gives me a headache.”

She gestured at the row of windows. “You’d probably like a universal gym and giant speakers blaring heavy metal music.”

“Hey, thanks for reducing me to a cliché. Actually, I was going to suggest yoga mats and gong music.”

The suggestion surprised Isabel. She could instantly picture a yoga retreat here. Maybe having Cormac O’Neill poking around and commenting on everything might turn out to be the start of something good.

Yet the thought of a stranger covered in beestings, staying in the house, swearing like a reject from a busy restaurant kitchen, was unsettling.

“Shit, oh, man.” As if he’d read her thoughts, he staggered and grabbed the doorknob.

“What’s the matter?” She clutched at his arm. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, sorry, I’ll be okay. Post Adrenalin letdown,” he said. “Feels like vertigo.”

“What can I do?”

“Maybe a rest and a shower.”

She escorted him back to Erik’s room. “All right,” she said, feeling flustered again, “you should find everything you need here.”

He paused, studying her. “I already have.”

* * *

Cormac O’Neill had been to a lot of places in his life, too many to count. But as he stood at the window of his room at Bella Vista, he couldn’t recall a place that rivaled the beauty of the Sonoma hacienda. Looking out at the orchards and fields, he felt a million miles away from the war-torn places of the world, the airports and grimy cities, the long barren stretches of scorched earth in the foreign lands he’d visited. During his career, he had lived in mud huts and tents, in hovels and out in the open, being eaten alive by bugs or shivering in an unheated room. He could do worse than a luxurious villa in Archangel, that was for sure.

Staggering off an overseas flight at SFO this morning, he’d borrowed a buddy’s Jeep, gulped a double shot of espresso and had driven straight from San Francisco to Archangel, hoping to relax and sleep off the jet lag. Instead, he’d encountered the skittish and suspicious Isabel, who had kneed him in the groin. Next came the swarm of bees and the trip to the urgent care place. He wondered what the next disaster would be.

When Tess had told him about the book project, she hadn’t mentioned hostile women and swarms of bees. In fact, she’d characterized it as a working vacation of sorts, a way for him to recover from his bum knee by soaking up the charms of Sonoma County.

In contrast, Bella Vista was lush and seductive, the landscape filled with colors from deep green to sunburned-gold. Gardeners, construction workers and farm workers swarmed the property. Isabel Johansen was in charge; that had been clear from the start. Yet when she’d shown him to Erik’s room, she’d seemed vulnerable, uncertain. Some might regard the room as a mausoleum, filled with the depressing weight of things left behind by the departed. To Mac, it was a treasure trove. He was here to learn the story of this place, this family, and every detail, from the baseball card collection to the dog-eared books about far-off places, would turn into clues for him.

And holy crap, had Isabel looked different when she’d given him the nickel tour. Unlike the virago in the beekeeper’s getup, the cleaned-up Isabel was a Roman goddess in a flowy outfit, sandals and curly dark hair.

Mac reminded himself that meeting Magnus Johansen was the whole point of this trip. At the moment, he didn’t feel like meeting anyone. The meds he’d been given, combined with the letdown after the shot of epinephrine, made his brain feel like cotton candy.

Rummaging through his duffel bag, he broke out the cream from the pharmacy and dabbed some on the itchy welts covering his arms, legs and hands. There were bites on his back he couldn’t reach, so he scratched himself on the bedpost, seeking relief.

He hoped the bees were not an omen of mishaps to come. He could always hope this morning’s disasters were an anomaly. His plan was simple. He would gather information about Magnus Johansen, a war hero turned orchardist, then settle in and write the story. It was what he did, what he was good at—telling other people’s stories.

The PR people who worked for his publisher liked to make much of his background. He’d been raised with five brothers by parents who worked in the diplomatic corps, traveling to the far corners of the world, their mission to spread peace and understanding. It all sounded exotic and glamorous, although for a kid, the reality had been far different—an endless succession of airports and foreign hotels, stifling tropical heat and painful immunizations and a new school every other year. The upbringing had taught him much about the world; he’d learned a few languages and had figured out how to be ready to go at a moment’s notice. But his way of life had never taught him how to stay in one place. The concept of home was foreign to him.

He went into the immaculate bathroom and took a quick shower in the old-fashioned claw-foot tub. There were perfumed soaps and fancy shampoo and lotions. Damn, it felt good to shower off the travel and the jet lag. He wanted to stand there all day, but he was here for a job. He put on clean shorts and a shirt, then put the knee brace back in place. The zipperlike surgical scar wasn’t pretty, but at least his knee didn’t feel as though it was on fire anymore.

He was supposed to be taking care of himself after his injury. The doc said his knee would never heal if he didn’t follow a program of physical therapy and exercise.

There was a knock at the door. “Hey, Mac,” said a voice. “It’s me, Tess.”

Leaning on his cane, he hobbled over and let her in.

She was as pretty as ever, red hair, tall and willowy. Actually, she was even prettier than he remembered. He didn’t recall the brightness of that smile. “Tess Delaney. Fancy meeting you here.”

“It’s great to see you,” she said. “We didn’t know when you’d get here.”

“I caught a flight from Taipei on standby. Borrowed a set of wheels in San Francisco and here I am.”

“Wow, that was quick. Oh, my gosh, it’s been too long.” With that, she gave him a brief hug. “I’m really glad we stayed in touch, Mac. Thanks for coming.” Her eyes sparkled as she grinned at him. “What?” she asked. “You’re looking at me funny.”

“You look really good, Tess. Glowing. Hey, are you—”

“About to marry the love of my life, yes. And no, I’m not pregnant. Just...in a different place than I was last time I saw you. A much better place, literally and figuratively.”

He sensed a mellowness about her he didn’t recall from before, as if her sharp edges had been softened. Maybe it was this place—Bella Vista. Maybe it would soften him, too. Except he didn’t need softening.

She stepped back and regarded him from head to toe. “You don’t look so hot. Isabel said you got stung.”

“Stung’s the word for it,” he murmured. “I’ll be okay. She was nice enough to take me to a clinic.”

“Good. My sister’s super nice.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

She set her hands on her hips. Tess had put on a little weight, and the curves looked good on her. She’d been really skinny in Krakow, skinny and stressed out. “She said you got off on the wrong foot this morning.”

“Ha-ha.”

She checked out his knee brace. “What happened?”

“Torn ligaments. I’ll heal.”

“Are you hungry?”

“You know me. I can always eat.”

“You came to the right place. Let’s grab something for you from the kitchen, and then we’ll go find Magnus.”

The “something” turned out to be a wedge of the most amazing cake he’d ever tasted. It had cream in the middle, a crust of honey and almonds on top. He crammed half a wedge into his mouth and moaned aloud. “Damn, that’s good,” he said around the mouthful. “Damn.”

“I already ordered it for my wedding breakfast,” said Tess.

“It’s called Bienenstich—bee sting cake,” said Isabel, coming into the kitchen. “Appropriate, under the circumstances.”

He turned to face her, his cheeks stuffed with food like a chipmunk’s. Then he swallowed the bite of food. “It’s delicious. Did you make it?” he asked, not taking his eyes off her. She didn’t look much like her sister. While Tess had red hair and freckles, Isabel had olive-toned skin, dark eyes and full lips, like a flamenco dancer or maybe an Italian film star swathed in veils.

“I did,” she said. “It’s a German tradition. You should have coffee with it.” She went over to an espresso machine that resembled the chrome front of a Maserati, and got to work.

Coffee. Oh, God.

He took out his phone, which was also his work computer, voice recorder and general organizer of his life. “I’m not getting a good signal here. Is there a wi-fi password?”

“I should remember that,” said Tess, “because we just upgraded. When I first got here, you couldn’t even get a signal. Isabel, do you remember the password?”

“‘CATSEX!!’ all in caps, with two exclamation points.” She shrugged. “I didn’t pick it.”

“Isabel’s the best cook in the world,” said Tess, raising her voice over the grind and hiss of the espresso maker. “We eat like this all the time at Bella Vista.”

He connected with his phone and scrolled through a depressingly long queue of unanswered emails. A freelancer’s dilemma—you were never really free. You just moved from one assignment to the next. He deleted a few nonessential notes, then pocketed the phone and helped himself to another piece of coffee cake, feeling charitable now toward the bees that had produced the deep, rich honey that flavored the topping. Seriously, he couldn’t remember the last time food had tasted so good to him.

After the espresso machine spewed forth a cacophony of grinding, whistling and a deep-throated gurgling, Isabel set a frothy cappuccino in front of him. The rich aroma rose on a wisp of steam.

“Okay, that settles it.” He wiped his mouth with a napkin. “I’m never leaving.”

“Ha,” said Tess. “You never stay.”

She knew him better than he thought. The longest he’d ever lived in one place was during college. After that, his permanent address was his literary agent’s Manhattan office.

Here, he felt like a stranger in a strange—and extremely seductive—land. In contrast to the places of his past, Bella Vista seemed weighted by a sense of permanence—the old country house with its courtyard and patios, the rustic stone barn and machine shop, outbuildings and weathered work sheds, the acres of age-gnarled apple trees, now covered in springtime blooms. He wondered what it would be like to watch the seasons change all in one place, year after year.

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” he told Tess.

She gave a dismissive sniff, then turned to her beauteous sister. “He never stays. Mac is a rolling stone.”

Isabel offered a bowl full of raw sugar crystals. “Good to know,” she said.

“I’m wounded,” he said, adding sugar to his coffee. “Why is it good?”

“I like to understand who I’m dealing with. So do you prefer Mac or Cormac?”

“Either.” The piercing mechanical whine of a saw came from somewhere outside. “You’ve got a lot of work going on around here,” he said. “If this is a bad time—”

“It’s a perfect time,” Tess interrupted.

He sensed what she wasn’t saying. Magnus Johansen wasn’t getting any younger.

When the shrieking of the power saw stopped, Tess asked, “So what do you think about Isabel’s project?”

What the hell did he care? The whole idea of running a vast estate, regardless of how historic it was, felt like way too much of a commitment to him.

“She’s turning the place into a destination cooking school. Did she tell you?” Tess beamed with pride.

“She’s standing right here,” Isabel reminded them.

“Cool idea, huh?” Tess asked, ignoring her sister.

“If you’re into cooking,” said Mac. “And school.”

“I take it you’re not,” Isabel said.

“I’m here for Magnus,” he said. “In the meantime, I’ll try to stay out of your way.”

“Ernestina told me he’s out with the workers in the new section of the orchard.” She looked him up and down, her gaze hard to read. “It’s a few hundred yards away. Can you walk that far?”

He nodded, gripping his cane as he studiously ignored the twinge in his bad knee. “Sure, let me grab my camera.”

“You’re a photographer, too?” asked Isabel when he returned with his gear. “It looks like a bazooka gun.”

“I take a lot of my own pictures,” he said. He’d found, in his work, that putting the camera between himself and a subject sometimes created a necessary boundary. Or if that wasn’t needed, it was a way to capture a moment, a mood or nuance when words weren’t enough.

The three of them stepped through a set of French doors leading to the central patio, which was swarming with even more workmen. Isabel led the way, descending a set of yellow limestone steps. He couldn’t stop himself from checking her out from behind. He kind of wished she wasn’t wearing all that flowy stuff because he suspected there was something much more interesting underneath.

Pretty women were one of his several weaknesses. There was something about long hair, shapely legs, tanned skin, smooth and soft... He couldn’t remember the last time he’d held a woman, inhaled the scent of her hair, pressed his lips to the pulse in her neck. He nearly stumbled over a tree root as he imagined what Isabel Johansen smelled and tasted like.

She turned back, scowling at him. “Are you all right?”

“Fine,” he said, clearing his throat. “Just taking in the atmosphere.”

They came upon a crew of workers with long-handled pruners. Speaking in Spanish that sounded smooth and natural, Isabel asked one of them where Magnus was.

One of the guys gestured at the end of a row of trees and waved. “He’s over by the new trees from the nursery beds.”

They headed down another row of trees. At the end of the row, Mac could see an old man silhouetted against the hillside, a ladder on one shoulder and a cane in his other hand. Tall and slender, in overalls and a work shirt, white hair sticking out from under a flat cap, Magnus Johansen moved with the ease of a much younger man.

Isabel called out to get his attention and he stopped, setting the ladder on the ground. He took off his cap and waved it at them.

Mac paused to take a candid picture while Isabel and Tess walked ahead, framed by the rows of arching trees in bloom. A timely breeze created a flurry of petals that filled the air like an unseasonable snowstorm. The camera lens captured the tableau of the old man and his two beautiful granddaughters, the moment gilded by sunshine filtering through the leaves. Nice.

Mac put the cap back on the lens and approached him. “Cormac O’Neill,” he said, shaking hands. “Good to meet you in person.”

Magnus’s grip was firm but brief. “I’m very glad you’re here, and on such short notice,” he said with a subtle lilt in his speech hinting at his Danish heritage. “Welcome to Bella Vista. I see you’ve met my granddaughters.” Though his face was pale, there was a glow of pride in him when he looked at Tess and Isabel. “I hope they gave you a proper welcome.”

Cutting a glance at Isabel, Mac thought about the knee to the groin and the attack of the killer bees. “Yep, she made me feel right at home.”

“You’ve come at a busy time. But the springtime is my favorite.”

“The scenery here is amazing,” Cormac said. He surveyed the area. The weather was almost unbearably perfect today, a stark contrast to the scorching deserts, barren tundras and steamy jungles he often had to visit on assignment. In addition to the construction crew at the house, there were people in every section of the orchard, some working alone, some in teams. Farming was as foreign to Mac as picking out draperies. “And your home is beautiful.”

“Yes. I have enjoyed much good fortune in my life.”

It was a startling statement, given what little Mac knew of the man. Magnus Johansen had lost his family in the war, and had outlived his only son and his wife. He had survived a head injury not so long ago. And yet here he stood, elderly but still proud, beaming at his granddaughters. Mac was suddenly more interested in Magnus, anxious to find out how the man had endured all that, yet could still call himself lucky.

“So,” said Magnus. “We must get to know one another.”

“My thoughts exactly.”

“I’ve read some of your books. I’m honored that you’re going to be writing about me. I warn you, though. I have a very long story to tell.”

Mac’s gaze kept straying to Isabel. She clearly didn’t like him, and despite what his libido was telling him, he didn’t like her, either. Still, there was something about her, not just the slender ankles and the pretty dark hair, but some vibe that drew him, even as he told himself she was a complication he didn’t need in his life.

“I’ve got time,” he said.