Chapter 28
Chapter Twenty-Eight
E loise stood in the foyer of the Cliffside Inn, her heart beating out a steady rhythm. Aaron threaded his fingers through hers and squeezed, and she looked up at him. He wore a kind smile, and a lot of the stress that had been in his face for the past few months had disappeared.
She knew he loved his job, but his job brought a lot of stress into their lives. He dealt with all of the islands in the cove, and they were each different and unique, with seemingly their own cultures and types of problems.
While she and Aaron had talked about her selling the inn, and what she’d do once it was gone, they hadn’t had a discussion about him retiring from the force. She wondered if he’d like to, but she knew he’d never bring it up. After all, he had a very good job that he enjoyed, and he’d be fifty next month. He had plenty of years left in him to keep the peace in Five Island Cove.
She might drown under the politics, but Aaron didn’t seem to mind them.
Either way, Eloise would wait until the inn sold, and then they’d have the conversation. After all, they’d have a huge influx of cash, and they didn’t need two salaries to support their family.
“The photographer is here,” Aaron said, and Eloise turned toward the door. A tall, thin man with a camera looped around his neck came into the inn right behind the realtor.
“Morning, Eloise,” Prue said. “This is Sam. He’ll be taking pictures for the listing and the brochure.”
“Nice to meet you, Sam,” Eloise said, her experience with people shining through. She could pretend when she needed to, that was for sure. “Hey, Prue.” She hugged the realtor who’d been walking her through everything for the past couple of weeks since Eloise had decided to sell the inn.
She turned as her mother joined them. “This is my mother, Dawn.” She smiled at her mom and then around at everyone. “We all want to walk through it with you,” she said. “If that’s okay.”
“Totally fine,” Prue said, taking the extra people in stride.
Eloise had gone to high school with Prue, and she’d started a new career as a realtor only a couple of years ago. She was one of the only commercial real estate agents in the cove, and Eloise liked how personable she was and how quickly she responded to messages and questions.
“All right.” Prue gestured toward the lobby, which Eloise and Aaron had spent the past thirty minutes arranging with the water and lemonade they normally served during check-in. Eloise had baked the cookies last night, but they’d still look fresh in the pictures.
“This inn has been a desirable piece of property for years,” Prue said. “I don’t think it’ll stay on the market for long.”
Eloise swallowed, because she’d gotten offers from bigger hotel chains and conglomerates, and she told herself—not for the first time—that it wasn’t up to her what happened to the inn.
She’d decided to sell it, plain and simple, and she didn’t get to dictate what the new owner did with it.
She’d be free from it, which was what she wanted.
Prue continued to direct Sam what to shoot, and he snapped and clicked so often the sound grated on her nerves. “How many square feet?”
“Twenty-four thousand,” Eloise answered. “Six guest rooms.”
And the thought of being free from it made her heart beat out a new song. She reached for Aaron’s hand and squeezed it as they led the way into the kitchen, then the laundry facilities, as they toured the pool, and as she unlocked the one-bedroom apartment attached to the back of the inn, where her day manager lived.
“And all the guest rooms are upstairs,” Eloise said. “On the second and third floors.”
“Elevator works,” Prue said as it chimed its arrival. They all crowded on, and Eloise checked the time. She had to leave by eleven-twenty to get to the ferry on time, so she could make it to the Glass Dolphin for the one o’clock Wednesday luncheon.
Her heart pumped out a couple of extra beats as she thought about today’s luncheon, because everyone knew about today’s walk-through with the realtor and photographer. Eloise didn’t usually sit in the spotlight, and surely everyone would exclaim over Alice’s twins getting engaged within a week of one another.
They’d all go over how Robin could make three weddings completely different this year. And of course, Kelli had asked for advice too.
So Eloise might not have to say very much at all.
She almost scoffed out loud at the idea. Of course she’d have to tell them everything. She’d fought hard to take ownership of the Cliffside Inn several years ago, and it felt surreal and almost like someone outside of herself had made the decision to sell it.
“Eloise,” Prue said, and she clued into the fact that they’d entered the largest guest room. “This looks amazing. The baseboards came out well.”
Prue had come through the week after Christmas and made a list of things that needed to be repaired, replaced, or redone, and Eloise had been working harder than ever around the inn. Her mother had brought the girls, and they’d all pitched in before school had started up again in the New Year.
Eloise had painstakingly cleaned and straightened every inch of the common areas of inn over the past week, and the place looked spectacular. She was a bit of a neat-freak anyway, but she’d taken it up a notch for this. The housekeeping crew did a nice job in the guest rooms, and she’d asked them to get them done in time for today’s photography.
“Do you have a price in mind?” Prue asked as she pulled back the heavier drapes in the suite.
“I have no idea what something like this would sell for.” She glanced at her husband, and Aaron nodded. They’d had this discussion a few times, and El was determined not to be greedy. While she’d poured money into it to keep it updated and running, she wanted it to go to someone who would care for it and the guests that came to stay there.
“Whatever fair market value is.” She didn’t need a huge, insane payday, though the inn was probably worth a few million dollars. She glanced over to her mother, who gazed around the room with a fond look on her face.
“You okay, Mom?” Eloise asked.
Her mother looked at her. “Yes,” she said. “Just…remembering things I’d forgotten.” She flashed a quick smile, but it looked a bit painful to Eloise. So much had gone on inside the walls of this inn, and that had been the demise of Eloise’s parents’ marriage, though she hadn’t known that at the time.
“I’ll leave you guys to go through the rooms,” she said. The inn suddenly felt too suffocating for her to be trapped inside.
“Babe?” Aaron’s fingers around hers tightened.
“I—We don’t need to be here.”
“I’ll go through with them,” her mom said, and she gave Eloise a much brighter smile.
“Thanks, Mom.” Eloise headed out of the room and down the hall. The carpet needed to replaced out here, but big projects like that would cost too much and would most likely not impact the sale of the inn that much.
At least according to Prue.
So Eloise hadn’t replaced the carpet. Such a thing would take a few weeks anyway, as the furniture store didn’t come to Sanctuary Island every single day, and Eloise would have to pick out the carpet, wait for it to come, and then schedule the installation of it.
She honestly hoped the inn would sell in less time.
Outside, the mid-morning sun shone brightly, the sky a beautiful blue overhead. That didn’t mean it was warm, and Eloise shivered in the cool air. She’d grown up right here on Sanctuary Island, and she did love how close it was to Diamond while remaining slower and calmer.
It truly had a small town island feel, and going to the center island had always brought excitement to Eloise as she’d grown up.
She took in a deep breath, enjoying the hint of salt in the air and the way the oxygen renewed her.
“Tell me what you’re thinking,” Aaron said.
“I just wanted to breathe for a minute,” Eloise said. “I’m not thinking anything.”
“Haven’t changed your mind?” he asked.
“No.” She turned toward him and put her arms around his neck. “I want to be home with the girls in the morning and afternoon. I want to get back to doing things for us instead of for strangers.”
She wasn’t absolutely certain about her decision, but Eloise had rarely been absolutely certain about anything in her life.
“All right,” Prue called as she came down the front steps of the inn. “We got what we need, and I’m going to go back to the office and run some numbers.” She arrived in front of Eloise and gave her a light hug. “I’ll call you later this afternoon.”
“Sounds great,” Eloise said. “Thank you so much, Prue.”
“We’ll get this sold, El.” She smiled in that shark-like way she had, and then she headed to her sporty little car.
“Well,” Aaron said. “I think that went well.”
“I do too.” She turned to him, and she grinned at him and then her mom. She linked her arm through her mother’s and asked, “You sure you don’t want to come to lunch with me?”
“Oh, I can’t do that,” her mom said, and Eloise hadn’t truly expected her to. She’d come to a few things at the holiday house, and Eloise’s mind spun forward another ten months, when she could begin looking for another huge vacation rental where they could all spend Christmas together.
And this time, she’d actually have the time to plan it without feeling like she might lose her sanity.
“Then get a ride with us,” Eloise said. “We’ll drop you at home on our way to the ferry.”
“Now that, I’ll do,” she said with a smile that didn’t stay as long as Eloise would’ve liked.
“Mom,” she said. “Selling the inn is okay, right?”
“It’s yours, El.”
“I know, but.” She took a breath, desperate for reassurance that her actions were okay. “It was yours for a long time too.” She cut a look over to Aaron, who kept his head low, his expression unreadable.
“It hasn’t been mine—nor have I wanted it to be mine—for a long time now,” her mom said. “Maybe it is time we let it go.”
“Yeah,” Eloise said, as she’d already made the decision to do just that. A bit of panic descended on her, and then Aaron called for a ride, and by the time she slid into the backseat with her mother, she’d breathed in and out a few times, and the confusion in her mind had cleared.
And as the car moved away from the Cliffside Inn, the weight of it became less and less and less. They dropped off her mother, and Eloise said, “I’ll call you later,” before the car continued to the ferry station.
Once there, Eloise once again felt like she’d made the right decision for herself, for Aaron, and for Billie and Grace.
She and Aaron boarded the ferry back to Diamond Island, where Aaron would head to the police station for the afternoon, and Eloise would head to the Glass Dolphin for her friend luncheon. She normally didn’t stay outside in the winter wind, but she did today, and she let it whip through her hair as the ferry cut through the water.
Aaron stood at her side, and she leaned against his strong shoulder. “I have the best life,” she said.
She did, and she couldn’t wait to spend the rest of it with her husband, her girls, and her friends.
I hope you loved spending Christmas with your friends in Five Island Cove! If so, please leave a review here.
Read on for the first 2 chapters of THE HAMPTON HOUSE , a brand new women’s fiction novel that follows Mandie Grover 5 years in the future as she works with a prestigious historical preservation and reconstruction firm that restores and conserves abandoned mansions up and down the Eastern Seaboard.