Chapter 3
“Maggie, did you get the linens off the clothesline?”
Julia knew she probably looked unhinged to the average passerby as she entered the kitchen in a whirlwind, a bucket of cleaning supplies in one hand and an assortment of rags in the other.
Her dark blonde hair was in a messy bun, too high up on her head for its current length, the shorter strands falling against her neck and forehead in sweaty tendrils.
She wore her best sweatshirt for cleaning—the one emblazoned with the logo for the Niagara Falls Hard Rock Cafe—and a pair of black bicycle shorts, representing some sort of deranged homage to one of Princess Diana’s better looks.
Normally she made an effort to look presentable during daytime working hours.
As owner, she felt she had a certain image to uphold.
She made sure to apply makeup and do her hair—nothing flashy, but again, something that showed she took her job seriously.
She was a reflection of this place. If she was put together, then it was, too.
Today, however, was not a day for put together. Today was a day for getting shit done.
For Ethan’s arrival.
For the arrival of all their important guests, she reminded herself sharply. Not just Ethan.
“On it!” Maggie said in reply to her question about the linens, tapping her wooden spoon on the edge of the pot and wiping her hands on her apron. “Can you keep an eye on this for me?”
Julia noticed for the first time that the younger woman was at the stove, getting dinner ready for the evening. The sight filled her with panic—was it already that far into the afternoon?—as she eyed the fragrant bubbling stew.
She was half-hypnotized by the alluring scent and half-uncertain about whether or not her presence would somehow ruin it.
She had planned on moving on to another one of her million tasks for the day while Maggie did the beds for her: cleaning all the high-touch areas, perhaps, or polishing the wood furniture she hadn’t gotten to yet in the dining and common areas.
But she was reluctant to interrupt or delay dinner preparation and even more reluctant to take it over herself.
“Why don’t I just get the linens?” she offered instead, backing out slowly. “I’ll be back for these,” she added, putting the cleaning supplies down in an unobtrusive corner as she made her way out.
“You sure?” Maggie called after her, already back to her stew. Julia thought of the bread she’d made that morning and how well it would go with it.
“Yup. Are you going to use—?”
“The bread you made this morning?” Maggie winked. “But of course. Nothing goes better with stew than fresh-baked bread.”
“Okay, because I can make another—”
“No need!” The younger woman smiled at her indulgently. “You have enough to do anyway.”
Julia had told her employees (all two of them) that they would be entertaining a few special guests over the course of the next week.
She had given them limited information—not because she didn’t trust Maggie or Norman, her groundskeeper, but because news tended to travel fast in a small town, whether people intentionally spilled the beans or not.
It had made for more guests, more word-of-mouth about her business, and for that she was grateful.
However, while this latest attention might be good for business, it still came with a risk.
If word spread that celebrities were tucked away in her guest rooms, the peace she had advertised would shatter under the weight of all those curious neighbors.
She, of course, wanted to benefit from their names being whispered after they’d gone—she just didn’t want a crowd outside her front door while they were still inside.
Especially since, from what he had told her in their brief phone call, Ethan had sold the location to their celebrity guests as one where they would be secluded and undisturbed.
It had been odd, for lack of a better word, to hear him talk about the place—her place—with the familiarity she knew he must still feel entitled to.
In fact, the whole conversation had been enough to set her apprehension skyrocketing for the rest of the week.
She’d tried not to think about it, tried to distract herself with tasks so that she wouldn’t focus on the sound of his voice after all these years or the familiar way his breath hitched between thoughts or his self-deprecating sense of humor.
All the things that had been so warm, so comforting to her once before, had now been ruined with a disastrous reaction and a few choice words.
She’d help him. Perhaps she even owed him that much.
But she wouldn’t—couldn’t—forget.
A buzz in her pocket jolted her out of her thoughts, and she felt her heart jump into her throat.
She pulled her phone out with fumbling fingers and glanced at the name on the screen—already creating scenarios in her head in which Ethan backed out or sent an assistant or decided to use another bed-and-breakfast on the other side of the lake—when she saw Granddad lit up on the screen.
With a groan, she forwarded the call to voicemail. She had a soft spot for the old curmudgeon—he’d come back into her life years after everything had happened with her mother and had always tried to help in his own way—but now was not the time for mindless chitchat.
She was on a mission.
She walked quickly toward the laundry room and grabbed a clean, empty basket before heading back into the kitchen, bypassing Maggie again, now fully immersed in her stew, and stepping out the double doors that led to the unobtrusive walk-out backyard—her favorite way to exit the house.
The stone steps leading up the hill to the gardens were something she hadn’t changed, refused to touch, because to do so felt like tampering with the landscape itself.
And when she walked up those stairs into the yard, whether it was the first time or the thousandth, the lake on the horizon, slowly revealing itself with each step, never failed to take her breath away.
It was cool out, even for September, with a crisp wind announcing the imminent arrival of fall and colder weather, but Julia was melting from all the running around she’d been doing, so she didn’t mind the coolness or the breeze.
There was also a stillness that she appreciated, a moment of quiet peace as she took in the rustling trees, the burgeoning reds and oranges of their leaves adding a burnished contrast to the stark blue of the cloudless sky.
This was her favorite time of year: the temperatures dropping, the colors heightening, the lake often fickle, unpredictable in its decision of how it would behave that day—anywhere from calm placidity to a tempestuous gray roil.
She took a minute to enjoy it all, closing her eyes and inhaling deeply, allowing the fresh air to move through her chest, filling her lungs and then holding it there, almost painful for a moment.
But it felt too good, the ability to take a deep breath and to feel the air go all the way down into her chest, practically touching her stomach.
There had been too many times in more recent years when that feeling had been elusive, almost impossible to achieve.
Too many times when the air had refused to enter her lungs altogether and she would have given anything to be able to do what she was doing now.
She didn’t know what had caused the onset of these moments, couldn’t pinpoint exactly when or why they had begun. But if anything had come from all that nonsense, it was the ability to appreciate a deep breath once in a while.
Blinking her eyes open, she recentered herself on the task at hand.
Bedsheets.
Making her way around the backyard, through the gardens to the clothesline, she started to pull the linens down efficiently, tossing clothespins into the small bucket that hung just beside the pulley as she drew the line closer to her with each sheet and pillowcase that fell gracefully into the laundry basket at her feet.
The task was mindlessly repetitive, and if there was one thing she’d actually enjoyed about all her errands the last few days, it was that most of them tended to be the same.
Simple enough that no real mental output was required in their completion, so she could go through the motions of doing the job and fulfilling her duty without the pesky interference of things like thoughts or feelings.
The leaves rustled in the trees as another gust of wind nipped through, tickling the loose hairs at the base of her neck and causing a slight shiver to run down her spine.
Maybe it was cooler than she’d realized.
The exposed bare skin on her legs prickled with goose bumps at the mild, obtrusive chill.
Looking back on that moment, she would never be able to explain it to herself.
The way she’d just known. It had been as if the wind had cut out, the trees silencing themselves, the gooseflesh on her legs rising up her body, spreading over her arms and up the nape of her neck in a way that had nothing to do with the cold.
She paused, clothespin poised in the air between her fingers, pillowcase hanging haphazardly by one corner, as she willed the silence to end, the wind to pick up again, the trees to resume their dance.
But there was no resisting the inevitable. She knew what she had to do—she had to face it head-on.
A steadiness she didn’t quite believe in settled over her as she dropped the clothespin into the bucket and wiped her damp palms against her shorts before she turned.
And then, as if the moment had been circling her for years, just waiting for the right time to land, her eyes met Ethan’s.