Waiting for Patrick
By Brynn Stein
Architect Elliot Graham has bought and restored dozens of historic homes to their original splendor. As in his personal life, he loves them and leaves them, selling them off without looking back. But there’s something about the old plantation house he finds in South Carolina—a connection he can’t explain. He feels as though he recognizes the house, as if within its crumbling walls he might find something he doesn’t even realize he’s lost.
Ben Myers had promised his lover and soul mate, Patrick, that he would wait for his return. Ben has kept his word ever since Patrick left him to wait at the plantation house—during the Civil War. For the first time in many long years, Ben is no longer alone, and he reaches out to Elliot in dreams. Elliot tries to convince Ben that Patrick isn’t coming back, and Ben’s devotion is about to change not only his lonely existence, but Elliot’s life as well.
Table of Contents
ELLIOT GRAHAM
pulled his Audi into the semicircular drive of his newly acquired, old plantation home and parked just in front of the entryway. Throwing open the car’s back door, he grabbed his suitcase and overnight bag and started toward the porch, noticing as he went some of the improvements he wanted to make to the outside. The shrubs and small flower beds to either side of the steps were no doubt once manicured but now needed someone’s loving attention. Dying plants, grass, and weeds threatened to choke the purple flowers currently receiving the attention of dutiful butterflies. The boughs of the shrubbery drooped tiredly, and the landscaping bricks bordering the flower beds seemed to have given up, since they were now lying flat on the grass and were sunning themselves around the perimeter.
Elliot trudged up the five wooden stairs, all of which would need replacing, and took in the veranda. Adding that to the mental list of projects he wanted to start as soon as possible, he used his newly obtained key and pushed open the front door. The ornamental glass panes to either side of it were cracked, but the door itself was solid.
He peeked into the living room off to the left of the foyer and took in the furniture that came with the house—the furniture that had sold him on the idea of living here rather than getting a hotel room for the extent of his stay. There were two large windows on the front wall and one on the side which looked out onto a large lawn. Elliot didn’t linger there now. He reentered the foyer and passed the stairs to pop his head in the kitchen.
Nice, it has a coffee pot. That’s all a good kitchen needs.
Finally he climbed the relatively well-preserved staircase to the second floor, trailing the fingers of one hand along the nicked wooden banister.
He turned left at the top of the stairs and passed the small bathroom on the right before coming to the master bedroom just beyond. This room also had a window opening to that large yard at the side of the house. As he threw his suitcase on the dresser next to the old Civil War–era bed, he noticed that the real estate agent had put on sheets and blankets, as promised. He was grateful that he wouldn’t have to find linens first thing. That was the last thing he wanted to do after traveling here from Chicago.
As he glanced around the room, an overwhelming sense of peace settled over him. He watched specks of dust play tag with an aged ottoman sitting under the window. The motes kissed the vintage leather, then darted away as unseen air currents aided their escape. He couldn’t help but drift over to the large bedroom window to join in the game. Elliot felt again that sense of rightness, of belonging, that he’d experienced when he first viewed the house. He’d been looking out over the spacious yard then too.
Elliot owned a thriving architectural design business that dealt with everything from restoring period homes to designing new high-rises, but he’d always had a soft spot for anything concerning the nineteenth century. Usually when he made an acquisition, he mapped out all the changes needed to restore it to period-perfect condition, did some of the work himself, if he was in the mood, but hired most of it out, and then sold it for enough profit to buy the next project. He had a CEO to take care of the day-to-day business of the three branches in various states, including the head office in Illinois. He stayed as involved as he had to, but mostly he managed from afar and worked on the projects that caught his fancy. This one certainly had.
He ran the pads of his fingers over the various scars and gashes on the windowsill. They felt comforting… familiar, somehow. As he looked out onto the manicured lawn, he felt there should be an old oak tree in the center of the large patch of grass to the right. Somehow the space looked empty without one.
He had great plans for this house. He walked around the bedroom, still trying to decide whether to sell the furniture to collectors or let it go with the house if he resold it. He didn’t know why the
if
crept into his thoughts—he always sold the houses he restored. But there was something about this one….
Time to resolve that issue later. First things first.
He dug his cell phone from the back pocket of his tight jeans, scrolled down the contacts list, and dialed the number.
“Ellie!” The female voice squealed from the other end of the line as Elliot made his way back toward the bed, since that was the only place to sit, besides the ottoman. He didn’t want to disturb the game the dust motes were playing. “You never call. It’s always either text or e-mail with you. So this is either really good news or really bad.”
He had to chuckle. Sheri knew him so well. “Good, I think.” He paused, mostly to tease her, and plopped his six-foot frame down on the bed. “I’m in SC. Only about twenty minutes from your house, actually. I wondered if you wanted to get together.”
He had to pull the phone from his ear to keep the resulting screech from bursting his eardrum. Elliot could count his true friends on one hand, but those few, he would trust with his life. Sheryl Ross was one of his oldest and dearest allies.
“That’s terrific!” Sheri said in only a slightly quieter voice. “How long will you be here?”
“Not sure,” he answered honestly. “I bought an old plantation house on the west side of town. It’s gorgeous and in pretty good shape—” He took in the small parts of floorboard crumbling away in the corner and the damp patches on the ceiling making a halfhearted attempt at a dot-to-dot pattern. “—for its age.” He spied the room’s one-and-only electrical outlet underneath the window. “The biggest problem will be bringing it up to code. If I contract out the whole job, I’ll probably only be here a couple of days, maybe a week, but I’m not sure I’m―”
“Well.” Sheri sounded disappointed. “That’s better than nothing, I guess.”
Elliot chuckled and bounced a little on the bed, listening to the squeaking joints. He didn’t expect much luxury from furniture sold with the house. “I was going to say, ‘I’m not sure I’m going to do that this time.’ I might decide to stick around longer and do a lot of the work myself.” He immediately pulled the phone away from his ear again and spread out on the deceptively comfortable mattress. He decided not to even broach the subject of possibly making this his base of operations. He didn’t think his hearing could tolerate much more.
When she finished shrieking her delight, Sheri begged, “Come out to the club with me tonight.”
“What about what’s-his-name? Won’t he mind me tagging along?”
“Who? Malcolm? He doesn’t go to clubs with me, but he says he doesn’t mind me going and doing whatever I want.” She chuckled. “He doesn’t even mind me doing
whomever
I want.”
Elliot decided to let that comment go for now. “Malcolm? Who’s he? I thought you were dating Jerry or Terry or something.” He stretched his legs this way and that, trying to gauge how much room the antique, three-quarter-sized bed might provide someone weighing two hundred pounds.
“Gary? That was four boyfriends ago! Keep up.” Elliot found it difficult to remember the ever-growing list of Sheri’s partners. He turned on his side and held the phone to his exposed ear.
“Was there a Joe in there somewhere?”
“Joey was before Gary.”
“How about Taco?”
“Nacho. He was two after Gary.”
“What kind of name is Nacho anyway?” Elliot picked at a loose thread on the gaudy, worn bedspread currently covering the old mattress, and made a mental note to buy a new one. Large yellow, gold, and green flowers on a red background just wasn’t going to cut it for him. At least it was clean. The scent of laundry detergent wafted up from it and teased Elliot’s nose.
“We had that discussion already, Ellie. I’m not getting into it again. Besides. He’s gone now, so it doesn’t matter.”
“So, what was wrong with him?”
“Not a thing. He simply decided I didn’t have the right parts for a long-term relationship. If you had been around then, I would have introduced him to you.”
“I don’t do long-term relationships any more than you do,” Elliot said absently as he got to his feet and walked back over to the window. He loved the view, and this seemed destined to be a longer conversation than he’d originally planned. He was so tired, he was almost afraid to lie down much longer. It felt too good. He was sure he’d drift off to sleep.
“Don’t I know it?” Sheri chuckled. “You never answered me about the club tonight.”
“Why doesn’t Mason go to the club with you?” Elliot watched a couple of stray leaves chase each other around the yard.
“Malcolm. Because he doesn’t do clubs,” she said, and then in an affected tone of superiority, “He’s too sophisticated and refined for clubs.”
“No offense, Cher, but what the hell is he doing with you, then?” Elliot could hear a dog bark in the distance, and wondered how far away the nearest neighbor might be. He hadn’t passed another house for at least five minutes by car on the way in. Maybe the dog was running loose.
Sheri laughed again, as Elliot knew she would. “Well, I’d never tried sophisticated before so… there’s the novelty factor.”
“How did you even meet someone named Malcolm?”
“Really? Elliot?” She said his name in as geeky a tone of voice as humanly possible. “You’re going to make fun of someone’s name?”
“Well, I didn’t really get a say in mine, so….” A loose piece of grille between two of the windowpanes caught his eye, and he poked at it with his index finger.
“I doubt he did either,” Sheri said, but then chuckled and added, “Though, as much of a control freak as Malcolm seems to be, if anyone could have chosen his own name as an infant, it would have been him.”
“Ooooh. You’re after the control, huh?” Elliot laughed, catching the aged piece of wood as it fell toward the floor. “BDSM now, Cher?”
“Stuff it, Elle.” She returned to the original topic. “Are you coming to the club with me tonight or not?”
“Don’t you have an event to cater or something?” Elliot still tried to distract her. Sheri had a significant trust fund left to her by her grandfather but wasn’t one to sit around and do nothing at all. So she had started her own catering service. She’d always loved to cook and had built up a pretty good business over the last several years. The best part about the job, she always told Elliot, was that she could choose her own hours. She loved her work, so it was usually easy to sidetrack her if he got her talking about her culinary art.
“I know what you’re doing, Ellie,” Sheri snapped. “And you’re not going to divert me from this. Come on. Go clubbing with me.”
He sighed and leaned both hands on the large windowsill, calculating how much it was going to cost to restore the windows if they were all in the same condition as this one. He was truly exhausted and didn’t feel like going out. But he hadn’t seen Sheri for a while and… well… it was Sheri, so he knew he didn’t have a prayer of saying no and having it stick. “I haven’t been clubbing in ages. You and I are both getting a little long in the tooth for such things, don’t you think?”
“Who uses ‘long in the tooth’ anymore? I mean it, Elliot. Sometimes you are so old-fashioned.” He could almost hear her shake her head to get herself back onto the original topic. “But, I’ll have you know, late thirties for me, early forties for you? Not that old, Ellie,” she said sternly. “Besides. I plan to be taken directly to the funeral home in my club clothes at the ripe old age of 103, thank you very much.”