Chapter Thirteen
TINS OF COOKIES CLANKED AGAINST each other as I rode my bike on the two-lane road to the next neighbor’s house. Mom hadn’t specified how many neighbors, but I was trying to hit everyone who lived in Sapphire Bay, even though I was getting the oddest looks when people opened their doors and I handed them tins of cookies and introduced myself.
The way some of them reacted, I was afraid they might call the police and report that a strange woman was running around handing out suspicious-looking packages. Or, you know, cute pastel tins that said “Made with Love” on them.
Honestly, I felt pretty stupid, like this whole endeavor was pointless. But then my mom’s voice echoed in my mind, her wishes stamped on the bucket list, urging me forward. For her, I pedaled up the long drive leading to an estate that seemed to be plucked from a dream. The pristine lakefront property unfolded before me like a painting, with massively tall pine trees standing guard around the enormous cozy-looking cabin. I had always thought of cabins as small and quaint, but this was a masterpiece, a paradox both grand and intimate.
The sun cast its rays upon the water, making it shimmer like liquid gold, while a gentle breeze whispered through the pines, carrying with it the scent of nature’s finest offerings. As I paused to take it all in, I couldn’t help but feel a tug at my heart—like something was calling me there. Weird .
I stopped and parked my bike, staring at the beautiful home before me, a little afraid to approach the front door. But, afraid I would look more suspicious if I just kept standing there, I grabbed a tin of cookies from the bike’s basket and tiptoed across the cobblestone path to the front entrance.
With trepidation, I rang the camera doorbell. Like an idiot, I waved. It was the nerves. Something about this place had me buzzing.
It didn’t take long for the door to open. To my ever-loving surprise, I knew the lovely woman before me.
“Lola.” I grinned so wide, my cheeks hurt. Oddly, I had thought about her so much over the last few days, I’d almost gone back to the Strawberry Festival to see if I could talk to her again. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I knew her from somewhere. And I was hoping her dad would be back in town. I would jump at the chance to talk to him, seeing as he loved the Roxannes.
“Brooke,” she said, seeming as delighted as I felt. “What are you doing here?”
I was glad she remembered me. “Funny story. You know how I told you about my mom? Well, she gave me a bucket list to fulfill this summer while I’m in Aspen Lake. One of the things on it was to make cookies for all my neighbors, which is super vague. So when I say neighbor , I mean I live like a mile away from you.” I held up the tin. “So, here are some triple-chocolate cookies.”
Lola laughed. “That’s so fun. And guess what? Those are my dad’s favorite cookies. He’s going to be stoked . You should come in and meet him and my mamá. They just got back into town. I haven’t even had the chance to tell him I met the daughter of a member of his favorite band.”
“Are you sure? I don’t want to intrude.” Okay, I totally did. I wanted to meet her dad and talk all things Roxannes with him.
“Of course. Actually, I’ve been thinking about you. I can’t shake the feeling that we’ve met before.” Lola waved me in.
“Me too,” I said, my voice barely a whisper as I stepped into the grand house. The sheer scale of it left me breathless. Floor-to-ceiling windows bathed the entire open and airy space in natural light. Someone had obviously carefully chosen each piece of furniture and every accessory to create an atmosphere of elegance.
It was like walking into the pages of an interior design magazine, where perfection was not just an aspiration but a reality. I couldn’t help but marvel. Especially since Mom and I had mostly lived in apartments or condos.
“Your house is beautiful.”
“This is where I grew up,” she said proudly. “I’m just home for the summer. I’m finishing up my MBA at Wharton.”
I wasn’t sure where or what Wharton was, but it sounded fancy and expensive. “That’s great.”
“Come on back.”
I followed her, still holding on to the cookies and afraid to touch anything in the immaculate house. I was so glad I’d worn a cute romper instead of my normal T-shirt and cutoff attire. This just didn’t feel like a house you were casual in.
As we walked into the great room, a large family portrait caught my eye above the fireplace. It showcased the beautiful family perfectly posed and holding hands on a white sandy beach. Lola and her mother practically looked like twin goddesses in long, flowy gowns. Her father was a tall, stately man with a kind, familiar face. I wasn’t sure what was so familiar about it. It was something I couldn’t quite put my finger on. What was with this family?
“Mamá! Papi! We have a guest,” Lola called out.
“Oh, here.” I handed her the cookies, feeling nervous. I don’t know why, but I didn’t want to give them to her elegant parents. They would probably react like most of the people I’d delivered them to today—with skeptical, sour looks.
Lola took the tin and peeked into it. “These look incredible.”
“My next-door neighbor gave me some great baking lessons.”
“Logan?” Lola trilled.
“Not him.” It caught me off guard that she remembered his name. “It’s actually his sister, Eden Russo.”
“ The Eden Russo? From A Dance in the Kitchen?” Lola lit up.
“Yes, her. ”
“Oh. My. Gosh. I love her. Her husband is such a cabrón,” Lola’s Mexican accent came out.
“I don’t know what that means, but yes,” I agreed. Eden’s ex-husband was awful.
“Who is a cabrón, mija?” The most refined woman I’d ever met came waltzing down the hall with her husband. She had styled her black hair in a sleek chignon and wore a cream satin blouse paired with neatly cut slacks. She radiated motherly warmth, yet there was a fierceness to her that clearly warned against crossing her. I was so mesmerized by her aura that I almost didn’t notice Mr. Harrington falling back from his wife’s side. He froze just a few feet away from me, his tan face paling at the sight of me.
I looked down at my teal-and-orange flutter-sleeve romper, wondering if I’d spilled blood on it or something—I didn’t know why else Mr. Harrington would look so horrified. I bit my lip and wrung my hands together, feeling uncomfortable. Oddly, no one else seemed to notice. Was I just imagining things?
“Mamá. Papi. This is Brooke Crawford. We met at the Strawberry Festival over the weekend. Papi, her mother is Roxanne from the Roxannes. I knew you would be stoked to meet her,” she teased her dad.
Mr. Harrington cleared his throat, and he looked anything but stoked to meet me. His tan skin turned sallow, and it looked like he was holding back vomit—and not the word kind.
“Hello.” I gave a little wave. “It’s nice to meet you.” Or at least I thought it was. Mr. Harrington was giving me weird vibes.
“The pleasure is ours,” Mrs. Harrington said in a refined Mexican accent. “I’m Camila Harrington, and this is my husband, Maxwell.”
Mr. Harrington zipped to his wife’s side and grabbed her hand and held on for dear life. “It’s nice to meet you,” he stuttered. “You’re Roxanne’s daughter?” He sounded like he was out of breath. Maybe he was ill.
“Yes. Did you meet her?” I’d just thought he was a fan, but it sounded like he knew her.
His neck broke out in huge red splotches. “We met a couple of times when the Roxannes were doing the college circuit, and they came to UNLV. She was a talented musician. Is she still playing?”
Huh. I’d just assumed he would have seen her perform at the Strawberry Festival, but it was neat he’d become a fan at college.
“Papi,” Lola said through gritted teeth. “Her mom passed away.”
He gripped his wife tighter. “I’m sorry to hear that, Brooke.”
“Please, don’t apologize. I’m just so excited to meet a fan of hers.” I wanted to know if he knew other Roxannes fans from his college days, but I didn’t get to ask.
“Oh, yes, my husband loves their music. He still listens to them on his ancient stereo in his office.”
I smiled, so happy. “I love that. My mom would have loved that too.”
Lola held up the tin. “Brooke brought cookies. Your favorite, Papi. Triple chocolate.”
Mr. Harrington said nothing, only blankly stared at the tin.
“Well, come sit down,” Mrs. Harrington invited. “And tell us about yourself.”
“Are you sure? I don’t want to intrude.” I could tell that Mr. Harrington was on edge about me staying. His eyes darted off to the side like he was looking to escape. I couldn’t figure out what his aversion to me was. Part of me wanted to flee, but something was telling me to stay.
“It’s no intrusion at all,” Mrs. Harrington stated.
“Please, stay.” Lola set the cookies down, pranced over, grabbed my hand, and led me to one of the cream couches in the great room, which had a wall of windows and a breathtaking view of the lake.
I smiled at Lola as she sat next to me. More and more I couldn’t shake the feeling that I knew her. It was kind of like when I met my best friend, Claire, the first day I started at the radio station. She’d been working in the marketing department that she now ran. There’d been this instant connection between us, like the universe was telling us we were meant to be BFFs.
Was the universe adding another BFF to my life? I wasn’t sure how Claire was going to feel about me coming back home with several new besties. Not that anyone could compare to her. It was just that I seemed to be collecting new friends like crazy in Aspen Lake.
Well, I was trying to. Logan was back to avoiding me. He could run, but he couldn’t hide. Scratch that. That sounded stalkerish, and I wasn’t stalking Logan. But I knew we were supposed to be lifelong friends, so I wasn’t giving up. At least not yet.
Lola’s parents sat across from us on matching armchairs.
“So, what brings you to Aspen Lake?” Mr. Harrington rushed to ask. The edge he’d displayed moments before was still in his tone. Also, was there a tremor in his voice? Or was I losing it?
For how nervous I was, it surprised me I hadn’t blurted out my entire life story already. But this was a different nervous. A kind I had never experienced before. I directed my attention to Mrs. Harrington, who was smiling and appeared more friendly, or at least more at ease, than her husband. Lola had made Mr. Harrington sound like he was a goofy dad, but I didn’t get that vibe. I had a feeling he wasn’t someone you wanted to trifle with. And somehow, I felt as if I already had.
“It’s a funny story, sort of. Right before my mom passed away, she made me promise that I would come to Aspen Lake and fulfill a bucket list. One that she made up, mind you,” I nervously tittered. “She loved Aspen Lake and, unbeknownst to me, she’d been saving a large sum of money for me, from the father I never knew.”
Part of me wished I hadn’t said the bit about my father. In this house, with what looked like the perfect family, it made me feel like less, if that made sense.
“Oh, goodness, did he pass away too, chiquita?” Mrs. Harrington asked.
“No. Honestly, I’ve never met him. I don’t know anything about him, not even his name.” I kept making myself sound stranger and stranger.
“Really?” Mrs. Harrington sounded astonished and intrigued.
“You know nothing of him? Nothing at all?” Mr. Harrington sounded like he didn’t believe me.
I dared to meet his eyes, which were wide with what I assumed was incredulity. “No, not really.”
“And you never asked?” he inquired .
Why did he make me feel as if I were on trial? “Several times, but my mom was an interesting soul—the best soul. But she also lived by her own set of rules. She believed it was my father’s job to tell me who he was, if he ever decided to.”
“Your mother sounds like my kind of woman,” Mrs. Harrington said. “Sounds like you were better off without the man.”
“I’d like to think so.”
“You never wished to meet him?” Mr. Harrington’s tone softened.
“That’s a complicated question.” It was my belief that as humans, we innately wanted to know where we came from and who we belonged to, but sometimes there were mysteries that were better left unsolved. Especially the one where my father paid off my mother and obviously wanted nothing to do with me.
“Papi, what’s with the third degree? You don’t even know Brooke,” Lola mildly scolded her dad.
“You’re right; I apologize. I just find your story interesting, Brooke. Tragic, even.” He pressed his back against the chair and sighed. “What kind of man abandons his daughter?” he asked, more to himself.
“No need to apologize. My mom would never want me to think of my life as a tragedy. And I don’t. Even though I’m an orphan now, for all intents and purposes.”
“Again, I am very sorry to hear about your mother,” Mr. Harrington said sincerely. “Why don’t you stay for dinner? I have some old newspaper clippings and concert posters featuring the Roxannes you might be interested in.”
Mr. Harrington’s shift in behavior toward me made me wonder if I had initially read him wrong. Regardless, I was definitely interested in seeing that memorabilia. It seemed he really was a big fan. “Thank you for the invite. I’d love to stay if it’s no trouble.”
Mr. Harrington didn’t reply. I’d expected him to say it was no trouble at all, but those words never came.
But Lola grabbed my hand. “I’m so glad you’re staying.”
I didn’t think Mr. Harrington was as enthused about it, judging by the way he scrubbed his hand over his face. It made me wonder if my staying was in fact troubling to him. But why would it be?