“Old man Gains’s wife used to do crafts and he built her a little place out in back of their house. Between you and me I think she was more interested in getting away from him than in twisting all those weeds around wires. But then the tourists seemed to like them.”
“Barry Gains? Isn’t he—?”
“In a home in Richmond now. After his wife passed there was no one to take care of him and his Alzheimer’s was bad.”
“So what happened to the house?”
“It was rented out until six months ago, but that guy moved. It’s empty now, and the realty company is supposed to be looking after it but they don’t. You wanta get it for your Sophie? Like the pumpkin eater?”
“What does that mean?” Reede asked.
“Peter, Peter Pumpkin Eater, had a wife but couldn’t keep her; put her in a pumpkin shell and there he kept her very well,” Al quoted.
“You know, don’t you,” Reede said, “that all those old rhymes are based on truth. Some man probably locked up his philandering wife and some smart-ass made a rhyme about it.”
Al didn’t blink. “You want the house so your would-be wife doesn’t take to philandering? Keep her busy making mud pies?”
Reede started to defend himself but changed his mind. “I want to keep
her from leaving town when she finds out the truth about me. And stop looking at me like that. Desperate men do desperate things. You have the number of the Realtor?”
“On speed dial. My wife is handling the place—and if you’re helping on the rent I’m going to tell her to double it because she’s got a tenant who will pay anything for a pumpkin shell.”
As he got up to leave, Reede didn’t protest because being overcharged on rent was the least of his worries.
When he got to his car, he reached under the seat and withdrew the envelope containing the Treeborne cookbook. He’d told Sophie that he’d make sure it was sent to his friend in New Zealand, and he meant to. What he hadn’t promised her was that he wouldn’t look at it—or make a copy of it. Sophie seemed to think—hope—that the Treebornes wouldn’t press charges, that if they got their precious cookbook back they wouldn’t tear the world apart looking for her.
But Reede wasn’t so sure. They might worry that a copy of the cookbook would be put on the Internet. If that happened the secrets of Treeborne Foods would be revealed. And even if all that was shown was how much oregano was used in the spaghetti sauce, it would kill an ad campaign that was over a hundred years old. They’d no longer be able to flaunt their “secret” recipes when the Internet was plastered with them.
Maybe the Treebornes were trustworthy, but from what Reede had heard, they played dirty. Father and son together had used and discarded a sweet girl like Sophie without even a backward glance.
He drove to his office, made a photocopy of the old cookbook, packaged it, addressed it to his friend, and put it in a drop-off box. Maybe he wouldn’t need the copy but it was better to be prepared.
“It’s perfect,” Sophie said as she looked around the house. It wasn’t very big and it needed cleaning and repairs, but it was more than suitable. There were two bedrooms and two baths, a pretty living room with a sunporch to one side. She could see herself sitting in there on rainy days while Reede . . .
She had to look away to clear her vision. It seemed that in just a few days she’d gone from one man to another. All summer her mind had been full of Carter and now there was only Reede.
All the bad that had happened to her seemed to fade. Everything had been replaced by Reede, and it was like she’d known him all her life. What he wanted and needed were of great importance to her, but she couldn’t possibly move in with him. Could she? She’d just seen the little studio where she could work, even though she had no idea what she would do. Maybe it could be a shop where she could sell her work to tourists.
She looked back at the sunroom. Who was she kidding? She wanted Reede to leave Edilean, and she wanted to go with him. She’d like to pack a bag and . . . Do what? Reede would need a woman who was a doctor or a nurse, not someone whose only talent was carving things. Of course she could cook and that might be useful.
She knew she was being ridiculous. Reede was going to leave Edilean in two and a half years, and there was no way he’d want a woman with him. Kim had always complained that her brother was a loner, that he got restless after even four days at home with them.
Sophie knew she needed to think about herself. To make plans for her own future. When Kim returned from her extended honeymoon she’d be living in Edilean, and when Jecca finished her training in New York, she too would be living there. It made sense for Sophie to stay in Virginia. She had nothing waiting for her back in her hometown. The Treeborne name was everywhere—and Sophie never wanted to see it again.
And by the time Lisa graduated from college, her world would be different. Sophie very much doubted if Lisa would return to her hometown. So what was there for Sophie? Taking care of her odious stepfather? Watching Carter get married and have children? Would his family come into a restaurant where Sophie was working and she’d wait on them?
The Realtor was looking at her and waiting for an answer. She was a small woman and thin to the point of emaciation. Sophie couldn’t imagine her as the wife of the man who owned the diner. His left leg weighed more than this woman did.
“Okay,” Sophie said. “I’ll take it.”
“I have the rental agreement here,” she said, “so if you’ll sign it I’ll give you the keys.”
“I don’t have a local check,” Sophie said and knew that she couldn’t use the small amount she had in the bank back home anyway. The Treebornes owned the bank, and they’d see where she cashed it. “And I haven’t been paid yet so . . . ”
“That’s all right. Dr. Reede is vouching for you, so that’s good enough for us.”
Sophie turned away so her frown couldn’t be seen. She didn’t like being dependant on someone, especially not a man. To have slept with him one night and the next day to be renting a house with his help made her feel less than virtuous. If the Realtor had said Reede was paying for the place, Sophie would have walked out. But he was only verifying that she did have a job and that she wasn’t likely to run out on the lease. It would be the same if Kim were her reference.