Chapter 4 #2
I didn’t answer, simply got out of the car and shut the door with a crisp snap. I hurried to Dad’s truck and pretended to be getting into it. Once I was satisfied that the man had driven away, I relaxed my shoulders and turned around.
The first thing my eyes landed on was the sign I had missed last night:
FOR SALE
The shock of it, the hard reality, was another trickle of ice water down my back.
This was the plan everyone expected me to follow.
It was a plan that made sense, now that I could see the Frisky Cricket in the light of day.
The cracks in the foundation were bigger than I’d realized.
Shingles were missing from the roof. The front door was grimy and needed a good scrub.
But it was still my waterfall.
I approached the front door and tugged its long metal handle, but as expected, it was locked. Glancing up, I could see there were no security cameras, so I began searching for a spare key. I checked beneath the floor mat, inside the potted shrubs, and above the doorway, but there was nothing.
Then something brushed across my calves. It was the black cat from last night, staring up at me with those vivid green eyes. She mewed as I bent down to pet her.
“Hi, friend,” I said quietly. “Are you hungry? If you can lead me to a key, maybe I can find you some food.”
She curled against my legs and let me rub her back until she purred. It soothed me somehow. Maybe she was a sign from Uncle George, a sign to keep going.
“Let’s check the back, okay?” I psspsspssed for her to follow me and we eased our way around the building to the back of the property.
It was larger than I expected—vast, empty land that stretched to an ancient tree line.
The sunlight spilling over the treetops nearly took my breath away, and I wondered if Uncle George had ever come here in the early morning, and if it had dazzled him, too.
I found the back service door and tried it: also locked.
This door, however, was less secure than the front one, with a simple key entry that looked easy to pick, at least based on what Emma had taught me a few summers ago.
I fished in my pocket for the bobby pins I’d brought along, then worked one into the door handle and began to fiddle with it.
I had just heard a promising click when—
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
I jumped and spun around. The bobby pins scattered across the wooden steps. The black cat hissed and ran away.
An old man was glaring at me from the garden plot along the perimeter. His wide-brimmed sun hat couldn’t hide the furious expression on his face. My eyes darted to the large metal shears in his hands.
“We’re not open yet,” the man barked in a high, grizzled voice.
My heart was racing, but I seized on that telling pronoun: We. Was this another employee, like Hannah?
“You work here, sir?”
“‘Work’ is one way to describe it,” the man huffed. “You gonna tell me what you’re doing?”
I stepped into the sunlight and raised a friendly hand. I would have preferred to stay incognito, but considering it looked like I was breaking and entering, I figured I needed to come clean.
“Sorry to scare you. I’m Louisa Wade.” I paused to make sure he felt the weight of my next words. “George’s niece.”
The gardener gave me a long, hard look. “I know that. Still doesn’t explain what the hell you’re doing.”
I blinked at him. This man also knew who I was? Had he recognized me from Uncle George’s bulletin board just like Hannah had? Even if he knew me, what were the chances he would believe me when I said this next part?
“This probably sounds like I’m making it up, but I actually own this place now.” I let the words hang in the air as a thrill raced down my spine. “Uncle George left it to me, but I don’t have a key yet, so I was trying to find another way inside.”
The gardener continued to stare at me. Then he let out a short, sputtering laugh. “You’re gonna need to try that again, sweetheart, because that didn’t make a lick of sense.”
I recoiled at the use of sweetheart but tried to give him the benefit of the doubt. Maybe this man worked as a contractor who didn’t stop by very often, which meant I would have to be the bearer of bad news.
“You know the owner, George Wade?” I tried in a soft, placating voice. “I’m sorry to tell you, but he died recently.” I paused to watch the gardener’s expression, but it was immovable. “He left me this bar in his will.”
The gardener gave me a long, appraising look—and then bolted toward me with a speed I hadn’t expected, brandishing the gardening shears like a weapon. My heart jumped into my throat and I backed away, reaching wildly for my phone—
The gardener came to an abrupt halt. He seemed to have forgotten he was holding the shears, because when he saw me staring at them in horror, he rolled his eyes and tossed them into the dirt. “For Christ’s sake, Louisa, I’m not gonna hurt you,” he growled.
I believed him. Not only because he dropped the shears and kept his distance, but because something in my subconscious told me this man was familiar, like a face I’d seen in a dream. “Do I know you?”
He crossed his arms over his protruding belly. “You did, once.” His keen eyes raked over me. “Hmph. You’ve got the Wade hairline. Widow’s peak.”
I nodded tentatively, wondering what that had to do with anything. “Okay. Who are you?”
The shadow of a smile crossed his face, almost like he was deeply amused by the whole exchange. “Marion Hatchet. The actual owner of this ugly old money pit.”
My heart skipped a beat. “What?”
“If you wanna see it that badly, come back when we’re open and I’ll give you the tour. You don’t have to cook up some story and bust your way in.”
“No—but—I thought Uncle George owned this place.”
“He did. Alongside me.”
My mind started buzzing, putting the pieces together. I remembered last night, asking the bartender if he knew the owner, and how his response had been, Which one? I remembered Otis Penny’s voice reading the dry, legalistic language about my inheritance …
“Oh my god,” I said under my breath. “He left me half a bar.”
“I beg your pardon?” the gardener asked, tightening his arms over his belly.
“‘Full ownership stake,’” I recited. “That’s what Otis Penny said. He meant the fifty percent that Uncle George owned, didn’t he?”
The gardener went eerily still. “You talked to Otis Penny about this?”
For the first time, I realized I had the upper hand.
I looked into the gardener’s scowling face and took my time answering.
“Yes, sweetheart, Otis Penny came to my grandparents’ house yesterday for the reading of the will.
He named every person my uncle left something to.
When it got to me, he said Uncle George had left me his ‘full ownership stake’ in the Frisky Cricket. ”
All the color drained from the gardener’s face. He stared me down again, but this time it seemed like he was praying for the punch line to the joke.
“Well,” he said finally, more to himself than me. “Well.”
He fished his phone out of his pocket and held it a good two feet in front of his face, searching through it. Then he dialed whomever he was calling. From my spot on the steps, I heard a tinny voice pick up.
“No, it’s damn well not,” the gardener said, irritation once again lacing his grizzled voice.
“A certain Miss Louisa Wade”—he glowered up at me—“is down here at the Cricket claiming she owns the place.” Pause.
“Yes, I think I know who I’m looking at.
Uh-huh. Why don’t you check, then?” Pause. “Uh-huh. You’d better come down here.”
He hung up without a goodbye.
“Who was that?” I asked.
The gardener ignored me and took his time putting his phone back in his pocket.
He gestured for me to sit on the steps. “Might as well pick up those bobby pins while you wait. Don’t wanna leave evidence of your breaking and entering.
” He threw me a final glare and skulked off to the garden without another word.
I hovered on the steps, trying to decide what to do.
My pulse tripped with the possibility that this man had called the police, in which case I should get out of here until I could secure a copy of the will to prove my legitimacy.
But the tone he had used was a familiar one, not like he was reporting a crime.
It was more likely he had called someone he knew, someone who had a stake in what was going on here.
Maybe it was Otis Penny, who would no doubt clear up the situation and might even give me a key.
It was worth waiting around to find out. I eased myself onto the steps and gathered up the bobby pins as discreetly as possible, refusing to let the gardener think he could boss me around.
Fifteen minutes later, my dad rushed into the backyard.
“Dad!” I called, relieved to see a familiar face. I forgot that I was still angry with him—I was just thankful to have an ally right now. “How’d you know I was here?”
Dad’s clothes were rumpled like he’d just rolled out of bed. “Louisa—” he said, eyes lighting on me. “What’re you—”
“Dad, that man over there doesn’t believe me about—”
But Dad looked past me and locked eyes with the gardener. He marched toward him, and the gardener did the same, and for one wild second, I thought my dad was going to throw a punch.
But he hugged him.
“Hatch,” my dad said scratchily, clapping him on the back. “You look good.”
“You wanna explain all this to me, Tate?” the gardener—Hatch—asked. He flapped a soiled glove around like that covered the whole situation.
“Wait,” I said, something clicking in my brain. “You called my dad?”
Hatch ignored me, staring expectantly at my father.
“She’s not lying, Hatch,” Dad said.