Home Sweet Home (A Southern Comfort Novel) (2 page)

Still, she was the hottest crazy cat lady he had ever seen.

“I
don’t remember it looking this bad,” said Jane in the loudest whisper known to man.

Grace didn’t remember either. When she’d come for the job interview at Pembroke in early spring, her sister had driven down from Columbus to meet her and they’d gone house hunting together. Grace fell in love, signed the contract, and went back to California with a phone full of pictures.

Grace was glad she’d had a witness. Jane had fallen in love with the house almost as much as Grace had, although Jane had reservations about its age. Mary Beth had seemed reluctant to show them the place, said it might not be Grace’s taste. It probably wasn’t a lot of people’s tastes. It was gaudy and weird and old. But there was a turret, complete with funky stained glass, and Grace could see herself creating a reading nook in there. And there were windows everywhere! She could just imagine how wonderful it would feel to sit in the sun, or to light a fire in the fireplace when it was overcast and cold. It was never overcast and cold in California. She would never find a house like this in California. This was a New Life house.

And the porch! The porch had made her sad to go back to her second floor balcony-free condo. She loved sitting outside, and this house not only had a front porch, but a gorgeous, winding garden in the back. Grace had always suspected she had a green thumb, but apartment living was never very conducive to keeping plants alive. If she bought the house, she would have flowers and tomatoes and cucumbers and more flowers and a gorgeous dreamy yard that required hardly any mowing but would be the perfect spot to have garden parties and to concoct brilliant ideas about literature.

Now she wasn’t so sure that she hadn’t bitten off more than she could chew. Mary Beth had sent her pictures a week ago, showing her the work her brother had done on the house. Everything was neatly trimmed and pruned and there was a potted plant on the front step. Now the plant seemed in danger of sliding off the crooked step, and it looked as if the yard was not as familiar with a weed whacker as she’d been led to believe.

She turned to Mary Beth, who had seemed so sweet and nice and genuine. She’d made Grace feel like it was her life’s mission to get her into the perfect house. Mary Beth had gotten her a good deal and everything. At least Grace thought she had. Was she being hoodwinked? By this nice, snappily dressed realtor and her too-hot-for-his-own-good brother?

Because the brother introduced as Jake was ridiculous in his handsomeness. Even Jane, who was very happily married and who didn’t put a lot of stock in people’s looks, was gobsmacked. “Is this a joke?” she whispered to Grace when Mary Beth made the introductions. “This has to be a joke.”

“What?” asked Mary Beth, because Jane was the loudest whisperer ever.

“Nothing. I was just saying that your brother is so handsome that he can’t be real. Are you real?” Jane poked him on the forehead.

Mary Beth laughed, and way-too-handsome Jake smiled (which, damn him, made him even handsomer). The tension melted around them but Grace remained firm. She crossed her arms over her weird ironic cat sweater, and watched everybody laugh at her sister’s charming goofiness while the house she’d just spent all of her money on crumbled around her.

She was a little cranky from the drive. Then she caught Jake looking at her. He rolled his eyes and she got even crankier. Because it was one thing to be completely not attracted to a handsome man, but it was another thing entirely to be dismissed by him. She shouldn’t be cranky about that, she told herself, which made her even crankier. Plus she was tired, she was dirty, and she wished she hadn’t worn the ironic spinster cat lady sweatshirt Jane had given her for her birthday last year. To top it all off, the realtor Grace had thought might be her first friend in this town was sheepishly handing her the keys to a quirky, Victorian dump.

“I mean, it’s not that bad,” Jane said, as Mary Beth and Jake climbed the wonky steps behind them. “It’s pretty nice, really.”

Grace rolled her eyes at her sister. Jane’s true feelings about the house were written all over her face. Thankfully, once she rattled the door open, the inside wasn’t as bad as the outside. It wasn’t great, but it wasn’t turn-the-truck-around terrible. The sun shining through the old lace curtains revealed some swirling dust, and as Grace ran her finger over the mantelpiece, it came away with more dust. It seemed to swirl and dance in the sunlight and if it hadn’t been
dust
, for crying out loud, it would have looked magical. But just dust, she could handle. Just dust assuaged her impending panic attack when she thought about how much work she’d have to do to make the house livable before the semester started. If it was just dust on the inside, the outside could wait.

“It’s just dust.” Jake was inside the living room, running his finger over the windowsills. He looked up at the curtains as if to confirm, yup, those were dirty too.

“I know,” said Grace.

“I’m just saying, because you looked like you were about to storm out of here and turn that truck around.”

“Jake . . .” Mary Beth warned.

“I’m sure you can get someone to clean it for you,” he added with a shrug.

“I can clean it all by myself, don’t you worry about that.” Grace flounced away from the fireplace and headed toward the swinging door to the kitchen. In the time it took her to cross the floor, her cranky brain had conjured a dramatic exit, a perfect cut expertly delivered to the too-handsome Jake, then a flourishing turn through to the kitchen.

“I can handle—” she started, before being cut off by the swinging door crashing off of its hinges. The momentum she’d put into dramatically pushing the door open brought her down on top of it. Smooth, she thought. She’d really showed him. Half of a cut direct and now she was on her butt in the kitchen, on top of the door, a cloud of magical pixie dust settling around her.

Grace sneezed. What had she gotten herself into?

Jake was not sure which instinct came first—the one to laugh as Grace Buster Keaton-ed through the kitchen door, or the one to run to her and pick her up because the fall kind of looked like it hurt. He decided to pretend he was the better man and rushed forward to check on her. She was fine. Red as a beet and scowling, but no injuries. Grace reached for her sister’s outstretched hand, but Jake didn’t like the way she ignored his. So he stuck his hands under her arms and hauled her up.

The look on her face as she got her feet underneath her was pretty much what he expected: angry, horrified, embarrassed.

“Jake,” Mary Beth said behind him. Fine, yes, he shouldn’t manhandle her clients. But he was just trying to help.

“Are you okay?” Jane asked, putting a protective arm around her waist.

“Yes, fine,” Grace said, pulling her sparkle-cat sweatshirt back into place. Jake tried not to observe that the sweatshirt was doing her no favors, and that underneath she felt soft and solid.

“What’s the deal, Mary Beth?” Grace whirled that soft and solid body on his sister. “I thought this house passed inspection?”

“It did! I don’t know what—”

“Is this some kind of joke?” said Grace. “Get the new girl to buy a piece-of-crap house and laugh because you got your swindle on?”

“I swear to you, Grace, I have no idea why this is happening. You’re right, the house passed inspection, and nobody has been in here since the old owners moved out.”

“You’re sure there wasn’t a bunch of, I don’t know, dismantling elves in here?”

Jane snorted. Jake tried not to.

“Because if this is how you do business—”

Mary Beth took a step back and Jake stepped in. He was willing to make allowances for Grace’s anger because she was in a pretty tough position and she had just made a fool of herself, but stepping up to his sister like that was not going to fly.

“Watch it,” he warned.

“Watch it? Watch it? What is that supposed to mean? You gonna manhandle me some more if I get in her face about the fact that I just got ripped off?”

Mary Beth looked close to tears. “I promise you, I have no idea—”

“Skip it, lady.”

“Don’t you talk to my sister—”

“Hey!” Everybody froze, fingers pointed at each other, as Jane shouted from on top of the kitchen door.

“Thank you,” she said when everyone was quiet. “Let’s talk about this like adults.”

“I am—” Grace started.

“Don’t make me use my teacher voice again,” Jane warned.

Grace scowled at her sister, but she stopped talking. She crossed her hands angrily over her chest, but she stopped talking.

“Grace, did you do your due diligence when you bought this house? Inspections, certifications, all that stuff we talked about?” Jane asked, hands on her hips.

“You know I did.”

“Mary Beth, did you talk to my sister about the possibility of things needing repair in an older house, even though there were perfectly fine new houses available in the neighborhood?”

“I did. But she fell in love with this one,” Mary Beth said, choking back a note of desperation. “I can’t blame her, it’s a beautiful house. But, Grace, I did warn you that it would need some work.”

“ ‘Some work!’ ” Grace shouted. “ ‘Some work’ is different from doors falling off!”

“It’s not a big deal,” Jake said. “Look.” He nudged Jane aside and hoisted the door up. He lined up the hinges, and the door clicked back into place.

Which was much easier than he expected it to be.

He thought he would have to prop it up, then go out to his truck to get some tools, or maybe run downtown to get some new hinges. But he stood it up, then
click
, and the door was working again. He gave it a tentative swing. It swung.

“No problem,” he said, turning to the three amazed sets of eyes staring at him.

“It shouldn’t have fallen in the first place,” mumbled Grace.

“No, but Handsome Jake here was nice enough to fix it for you, so no problem,” said Jane.

“No problem now, but what am I going to do when the next thing falls apart? What if this chandelier falls on our heads?”

Everybody took a little step back from the center of the room, where an antique iron lighting fixture was hanging.

“Grace, I know this is upsetting, and I really can’t explain why that door just fell off,” Mary Beth said, leading them toward the living room windows.

“Which was easy to fix,” said Jake.

His sister shot him a look. “But,” she continued, “everything should be fine. We did the inspection, the last owner replaced the water heater, the things that needed to be updated have been updated. That was part of the contract we signed. But it is an old house. I told you, it is livable, but it will require some TLC.”

Jane looked at her sister even as she addressed the realtor. “Are you suggesting, Mary Beth, that my sister heard your well-informed advice, but ignored it and did what she wanted to anyway? How unlike my sister to do something like that. How very, very unlike her.”

Jake guessed by the sarcasm dripping from Jane’s tone that this was par for the course for Grace. Of course. People like Grace, they got what they wanted no matter what.

And based on the scowl covering Grace’s face, she didn’t like hearing it.

“I tell you what,” said Mary Beth, ushering Grace into the sunny foyer. “What if we work something out? What if I got someone to come over here and help you fix things when they break? That way, you can enjoy the charm of this gorgeous old house, and you won’t have to feel like I did you wrong in any way.”

The back of Jake’s neck prickled.

“Let me guess,” said Grace. “You have the perfect guy lined up and his rates are completely reasonable.”

“No charge,” said Mary Beth calmly as she opened the front door. “The guy I’m thinking of doesn’t need the money, and he owes me a favor.”

Now Jake’s neck was on fire. There was no way . . .

“He owes me a lifetime of favors,” Mary Beth said, and looked right at Jake.

“Mary Beth—” he started to protest.

“She’ll take it!” Jane said, and slammed the front door in their faces.

The house shuddered at the slam of the door. Things were not working out yet, but they rarely did at first. The heavy footfall on the front steps definitely belonged to the one, but now he was going away angry, muttering to the woman who had taken such good care of the house. The man had mowed the lawn and painted the porch rails. But if the house hadn’t been careful, the man would have finished everything before the new owner moved in, and that would never do. The house had a job to do, and no matter how much it hurt, the job would get done.

“W
hat did you just do?” Grace stared at her sister, who was smirking in a way that looked as if she was pretty pleased with herself.

“What?” Jane blinked, and Grace didn’t buy her innocent act for a second. “You don’t want that hot guy helping you with stuff around your house?”

“No! He’s a jerk.”

“You don’t have to talk to him. You just have to call him when something breaks and then ogle him from the corner while he works.”

“Jane, that is beyond creepy.”

“I wonder if he’ll take his shirt off if it gets too hot? Your air conditioner isn’t broken, is it?”

There was a quick knock at the door, and then Mary Beth’s head appeared through the opening. “I just wanted to give you this,” she said, thrusting a business card through the open door. “Jake’s cell is on the back.”

“Thank you!” said Jane, far too cheerily. “We’ll be sure to give him a call!”

Grace rolled her eyes at her sister. On one hand, Jane was right. Grace was not handy, and owning a condo with a twenty-four hour handyman had not filled any holes in her education. She had stubbornly pushed ahead with buying the house because she’d wanted it so badly. She’d figured she could get a few library books, learn along the way.

But things take on a different urgency when a girl is sitting on her own kitchen door.

On the other hand, Jane was totally, one hundred percent wrong. Jake was not the right man to help her out. He hated her, or at least he looked down on her. Even if he hadn’t acted like a jerk, she’d felt his disdain the second she got out of the truck. And she didn’t need a man who thought she was an idiot hanging around her house, proving himself right about her own idiocy by doing manual tasks that she was incapable of doing.

Plus, he was hot. He was tall and broad, and his jeans were just snug enough to make her want to see if it was possible to bounce quarters off a guy’s butt. His hands were big and rough, and he’d picked her up off her kitchen door like she weighed nothing. Grace knew she didn’t weigh nothing.

The worst part, though, was when he’d stood her up and she faced him. She was mad, and then she’d got a good look at his eyes. They were a rich, dark brown, and in them she saw some mockery, yes, but also concern and intelligence. Those were deep eyes. She didn’t do deep.

She couldn’t afford to like him. She couldn’t afford to like any man. She was done with that. She had taken the job at Pembroke to begin the spinster life she wanted to be destined for. No more men, no more distractions, no more lies. The last guy she’d let in, and she had only let him in a little, turned out to be a lying jerk with a superiority complex and a wife.

Plus, living for another person was not how she wanted to live her life.

“Hey,” said Jane, fingering Mary Beth’s business card. “Tell me again why we sent the guy with muscles away when we have a truck to unload?”

Grace looked out the window at the rented moving truck. “I thought Dev was coming.”

“Ha. You underestimate the number of distractions a four-year-old can provide when you’re trying to do . . . anything.”

“Priya is good, she won’t get in the way.”

“Again, I say ‘ha.’ I know you. You’ll get distracted by her cuteness and then Dev and I will have to do all the heavy lifting.”

“You shouldn’t have had such a cute daughter.”

“I still think we should chase Handsome Jake down and ask for his help.”

“No!” Grace knew Jane was joking—sort of—but she couldn’t help the panic that seeped into her voice.

Jane put her arms around Grace, rested her head on her shoulder. “Not all men are egomaniacal jerks.”

Grace snorted. “So far, Jake seems to fit the bill.”

“And not all love stories have to end badly.”

Grace shut her eyes even though she knew Jane couldn’t see her face. Jane was less than two years younger than she was; how had she been able to do it? How did she have a normal, happy marriage while Grace still ran screaming from any sign of commitment?

“Okay.” Jane swatted Grace on her butt. “No more pity party. You’re a successful writer, a brilliant professor, and the proud owner of the cutest money pit in town. Shake it off.”

Grace shook, hokey-pokey style, like they used to do when they were little.

“Good,” said Jane. “Now stop shaking and get those boxes moved, you crazy spinster.”

Jake followed Mary Beth to her office, hoping to get out of the deal with the new professor. It was either that or change his cell phone number, and he didn’t want to do that. All of his friends and all of his business contacts knew his cell number. And a lot of women.

On second thought, maybe he should change it.

Not that he minded a lot of women calling him. He liked women. He liked talking to them and hanging out with them. He had a different relationship with his female friends than he did with his male friends, and he liked that. Even though his female friends tended to try to set him up with their friends. The women around here usually knew Jake from high school, or knew someone who did, and they were just out for a good time.

He wasn’t complaining; he liked a good time. But sometimes he felt . . . cheap, maybe. Like they were just using him for his body. His head stepped in to remind him that he worked hard for his body; why shouldn’t he want people to use it? But there was another part of him, a deep, secret part he usually only let out when he was drinking alone, that wanted more. That wanted someone to want him for every part of him.

Jesus, he was hanging out with his girl friends too much.

All he knew was that Grace was a double-whammy—a woman who would just want him for his body,
and
a professor. His experience with professors was that they had a lot of smarts and no idea how to use them, at least not in any practical way. What was the point of speaking Latin?

“I can’t believe you did that,” he accused, sinking heavily into one of the chairs facing Mary Beth’s desk.

“You owe me, remember?” she said as she started up her laptop. He didn’t say anything back, just glared at her. She ignored him and started typing.

“I don’t owe you that much.”

“Sorry, are you still here? Darling brother, I have many appointments this afternoon, so while I’d love to sit and argue with you about how right I am, I’m afraid I just don’t have the time.”

“You’re such a snot.”

“You’re an ungrateful little brother. How many times did I bail you out? How many times did I say the beer cans under the couch were mine? How many times did I run out in the middle of the night because you got stranded somewhere by one of your meathead friends?”

“Fine. Yes, you did all of that. You were a wonderful sister. But that stuff was in high school. How long am I going to have to pay for stuff that happened over ten years ago?”

“Probably forever.”

Dammit. Jake regrouped. Their mother always told him, when his temper got too hot, that he could catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.

“You know,” Jake said, leaning back and folding his hands in front of him. Just real casual-like. “If it wasn’t for my bad behavior, you never would have met Todd.”

Mary Beth just sighed. Jake hoped it was a wistful sigh full of love for her husband.

“If you didn’t have to bail me out so many times, you would be a lonely old spinster, just like Professor Grace. You’d probably have a whole collection of cat sweatshirts.”

“Jake,” Mary Beth warned, “don’t make fun of my clients. And don’t make fun of new people in town! I think she seems nice.” Jake snorted. “Well, she seemed nice the other times I met her. She’s very smart, and she’s actually pretty funny. I think I’m going to ask her to join my book club after all.”

“MB, no English professor is going to want to join your dinky book club.”

“Well, thank you, Jake, for your confidence in my intelligence. Don’t let your phone die—you’re going to have a lot of calls to answer.”

“Is this guy bothering you?”

Jake didn’t even look up. He knew that voice, and he knew that joke. Todd Brakefield, Chief of the Willow Springs Police Department and Husband to His Sister, made the same joke every time he saw Jake and Mary Beth together. Todd insisted that it was so not-funny that it was starting to get funny again. After more than a decade of it, Jake wasn’t so sure.

Not that he’d argue with the man wearing a gun.

“Hey, sweetheart,” said Mary Beth, getting up from behind her desk.

“No, don’t get up,” said Todd, as he always did. Then, as always, he walked around her desk and gave her a peck on her cheek, and stood there a second, hovering over her, until she turned her head and he kissed her gently on the lips.

Since Jake had seen this every time he was with Mary Beth at work and Todd stopped by, Jake had to imagine it happened every time Todd came in. His sister was six years older than he was, and Todd was only four. And yet the two of them had turned into old farts.

“Well, if you two are going to start making out,” Jake said, standing up.

“No, don’t go,” said Todd. “I just stopped in for a little sugar.”

Jake threw up.

Metaphorically.

But still.

“Todd, you’re making Jake sick.”

“I’m not going to lie, that was part of my goal,” Todd said. “That, and some sugar.” He leaned down and kissed Mary Beth again.

“Okay, seriously. I’m leaving now.” Jake really stood up this time.

“Wait, what’re you going to do?” asked Mary Beth.

“I’m just going to go home, change my phone number, and move to Arizona where my sister won’t pimp out my immensely impressive home repair skills to every person with a bad attitude who moves to town.”

“What’s this about?” asked Todd, and Mary Beth filled him in on Grace and the state of the house, with Jake interjecting rolled eyes and sarcastic snorts.

“Wait, the Spinster House?” asked Todd. “You sold the Spinster House?”

“No,” said Mary Beth. “The Spinster House is over on Walnut.”

“That house? Baby, you know I hate to interfere in your business, but that pile of crap is a meth lab waiting to happen. That’s not the Spinster House.”

“Yes, it is! The logging heiress built it on the outskirts of town and then left with her new husband before she could move into it. And it was scandalous because she built it on one of the out-of-the-way streets so people assumed she was up to no good.”

“No, that’s the house built by her no-good brother. It was a brothel. That’s why it has all those porches and those tiny rooms.”

“Todd, I hate to disagree with you, seeing as you’re carrying a gun and all,” said Jake, “but I’m pretty sure my sister’s right. Look how big that place is. And, yeah, it’s falling apart now, but it has big money written all over it. The house that Mary Beth sold Grace is just . . . weird.”

“You ever heard of an eccentric millionaire?” Todd asked.

“Todd, I’m sure you’re wrong.” Mary Beth started clicking through on her computer. “See? It has a Wikipedia entry and everything.”

Jake joined Todd behind Mary Beth’s desk and they scanned the article together. Sure enough, the Spinster House in Willow Springs, Kentucky, was a dilapidated brothel-looking house on the outskirts of town. Not a cute but strange mini-Victorian in the center of town.

“You believe everything you read on the Internet?” asked Todd.

“That’s one thing I love about you,” said Mary Beth, wrapping her arms around her husband. “You’re always willing to admit when you’re wrong.”

They started whispering in each other’s ears and Jake knew it was time to get gone.

“I knew my sister was right,” he said, heading toward the door. “Otherwise, I would’ve bought that house and fixed it up. But I’m not touching anything called the ‘Spinster House.’ Not for a million bucks and a life free from professors.”

“Ah, yes—my brother, the confirmed bachelor.”

“I think that’s a euphemism for being gay,” said Todd.

“You wish,” said Jake.

“Boys,” said Mary Beth. “Jake, go away. And close the door behind you. I want to make out with my husband.”

Jake got whiplash on his way out the door.

“Oh!” Mary Beth called after him. “Mom wants to know if you’re coming to dinner on Sunday. Will is making lasagna.”

Jake scowled. His mom knew he couldn’t resist her husband’s lasagna. “Fine.”

“And Jake, be nice to the new girl.”

Jake growled.

Mary Beth laughed and put her arms around her husband. “She’s probably not going to call anyway,” she told her brother’s retreating back.

Good, thought Jake. He didn’t want her to call.